The Death God Alliance
by Asilda
Summary: "Sorry," said the son of Hades, "but if I surrendered to an organization called the House of Life, my dad would kill me." After a run in with the Kanes, Nico unwittingly ends up becoming a host for the Egyptian death god Anubis.
1. Chapter 1

1

It had been awhile since Percy's dreams took his spirit elsewhere while he slept. Things had been quiet since Kronos' defeat. For the most part he'd enjoyed dreamless sleep, but the few times he did enter REM cycles, the dreams that followed weren't sinister and filled with sights of enemies plotting against him or allies in dire straits.

So it surprised him when one night, out of the blue, he found himself walking in his dreams beside Nico di Angelo in Central Park. Nico didn't seem to be in any particular hurry or trouble. Even though it was night, and Central Park was full of muggers and other shady characters, he didn't take pains to cloak himself in shadows either. Percy pitied the man who tried to mug the son of Hades.

The boy was walking casually along the path, hands in his pockets, and relaxed. He tensed suddenly and slowed slightly as he seemed to realize he had company, but relaxed when he realized who his noncorporeal visitor was. "Hello," he said. He looked right at Percy and the older teen could see that his younger friend looked a bit quizzical. "I'd ask what brings you here, but I wouldn't be able to hear your answer."

_I'm actually more interested in why you're here,_ Percy thought, and as though he'd heard Percy telepathically, Nico continued talking.

"You might be wondering why I'm here. Or perhaps you've already guessed." He kicked at a clump of frozen ground. "My stepmother of sorts is being insufferable. Father says Persephone's always like that right before spring. She's stir crazy and can't wait to leave. Father's been sleeping on the couch since the middle of February, and last week I finally had enough."

_Why not go to Camp Halfblood then?_ Percy wondered. And then he had to wonder if Nico really could somehow read his thoughts.

"I thought about going to Camp Halfblood, but none of the people I like are there right now. And to be honest, I'd rather be alone. Not that your company bothers me, beings that you're not really here." Nico gave Percy a crooked smile. "Though I'm really not sure what brought your spirit here. Central Park isn't very lively tonight. To be honest, I'm kinda bored – ah!"

Without warning, Nico was tackled to the frozen ground by a dark shape that catapulted out of the air, presumably from the rocky terrain above him.

"Sadie!" a voice called from the direction the other person had come from. Percy turned to see an African American teenager half sliding, half stumbling down the slope.

"I'm okay, Carter!" shouted the girl who was perched on Nico's chest. Presumably Sadie.

"Ugh. Get off," groaned Nico, wincing as the girl shifted her weight onto his stomach. "Oh! Bloody sorry about that, mate!" Sadie stood up, but unfortunately kept one of her feet on top of Nico, making the boy yowl like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.

If Percy hadn't been worried for his younger parallel-cousin, he would have thought the situation was actually kind of funny.

"Sorry!"

"Who is that?" Carter asked, finally skidding to a stop at the bottom of the slope.

"Just some random kid I landed on," Sadie said, stepping away from the downed demigod. "Again, sorry mate, but we've got to . . ." she trailed off. It was hard to tell in the moonlight, but Percy was sure that her pale face had gone even paler. He turned to see what she was looking at.

"Not good," Carter said.

Not good was right. In fact, what was slinking out of the shadows was downright bad. At first Percy thought that it was a giant wolf or coyote, but its hair was too short and it was built too lean. It took the two weird kids whipping out strange weapons with hieroglyphics engraved on them for Percy to realize what they were facing. A jackal. Like the ones in the pictures of his history book when his class studied Ancient Egypt. Not that he had learned much from those books or lessons, but the pictures stuck in his mind better than the actual facts.

"Surrender," said a new voice from somewhere behind the jackal. "Submit to the House of Life's judgment and you'll be spared a painful death."

_House of Life?_ Percy wondered. Somehow that sounded like it should be a good organization. Not one that employed enforcers with giant jackals to jump kids in the park at night.

"House of what?" Nico asked, climbing unsteadily to his feet. "By the way, you didn't see that, Percy." He put a hand on the back of his head and winced. Percy frowned when he saw Nico's fingers were darkened by blood, and quite a bit of it. He must have hit his head on a rock when Sadie tackled him.

"This has nothing to do with you, boy," said the mystery speaker. His voice was now layered with a hypnotic undertone. "Run along home. There's nothing of interest to you here."

"Actually, there is," Nico said, wiping his bloody fingers on the leg of his black pants, then reaching inside his jacket. "You said House of Life, right? You're from a house of life and yet you have a pet jackal, which is a symbol of death. I actually find that insulting."

Carter grabbed Nico by the back of his jacket and pulled the smaller boy behind him. "He's obviously got a concussion and he's not involved in this. We should settle this another time, when there are no innocents present."

"I don't think so." Finally the speaker stepped forth from the shadows. He was a nondescript man with brown hair and medium toned skin. Average height, with no distinguishing features, the sort of person you wouldn't remember seeing, even if you walked by him on the way to work every single day. "The boy there perceived my familiar as a jackal. Not a dog, as most would, or a wolf if he was more imaginative. He recognized it as a jackal and is resistant to my hypnotism. He's got a magician somewhere in his family tree. Is he the one you came here to recruit, you heretics?"

"No, he's the guy I landed on when I jumped off that ledge trying to get away from your sleazy partner," said Sadie defiantly. "He has nothing to do with us and nothing to do with you."

"Enough talk," said their antagonist. "This is your final chance to surrender. Will you take it?"

In answer Sadie and Carter tightened their grips on their weapons and shifted into fighting stances. Nico looked amused in a concussed kind of way.

"Sorry," said the son of Hades, "but if I surrendered to an organization called the House of Life my dad would kill me."

"Mutef, bring the smaller male to me," ordered the House of Light member. "Kill the others!"

The jackal bounded forward with a snarl. It didn't make it very far. Nico drew his hand out of his jacket, now holding his sword of Stygian iron, and pointed it at the jackal. The ground beneath the beast began to shake and split apart, like the epicenter of a miniature earthquake. Hellfire sprung from the fissures and engulfed the creature. It whimpered and whined as it was pulled down into the earth, but there was no escape. The jackal and its master had been doomed the moment they pissed Nico di Angelo off.

"What the?" Sadie demanded. "Carter did you-?"

"That wasn't me," Carter told her. With both their backs to Nico they didn't see that the so-called innocent had been the one to summon the hellfire.

"That is beyond mortal powers," growled their enemy. "And thus you have revealed your true colors, godling!"

"I don't get you," said Nico. "Do you know who and what I am or not?"

Carter and Sadie turned to stare at him and started when they saw the dark sword in his hand. "Whoa," Carter said, grabbing Sadie's arm and pulling her a few steps away from Nico.

"I know what you are, but not who. A minor god, no doubt. Foolish to take a child as a host. And one who is so scrawny and obviously anemic at that."

Nico bristled. Percy wasn't sure if he was mad because the man implied he looked weak or because his lineage had been underestimated. What he was more concerned about though, was that Nico's head wound didn't seem to have slowed its flow of blood. Percy could see that it was dripping down the back of his neck and had soaked the collar of his jacket and shirt. Demigod or not, that was never a good sign.

"I sent your dog to meet my dog," said Nico, looking lividly at his attacker. "Cerberus is a good boy. He could teach that mutt of yours some manners. But right now I'm thinking of sending you to meet my stepmother."

_Just knock him out and get out of there, Nico, _Percy thought at his parallel-cousin, willing the boy to hear his thoughts, but either Nico really wasn't telepathic, or he chose to ignore Percy.

The House of Life man pointed his wand at Nico and a ball of fire shot toward Nico. The boy dropped to one knee and the fireball passed harmlessly over his head. He gave a savage grin and clenched one fist. A skeletal hand suddenly reached out of the ground and grabbed Nico's enemy by the ankle.

"What! Ahh!" The older man panicked and struggled to escape the undead corpse's grip.

"You'd be amazed how many bodies are buried in shallow graves around this city," Nico said conversationally, getting back to his feet. He stumbled a step, but regained his balance fast enough. "Parks and vacant lots are full of them. Most people would find that disturbing, but it actually makes me feel safe. I have allies wherever I go."

He started as Sadie stepped forward to grab his arm. "Anubis?" she asked, staring into his eyes.

Nico shook her off and gave her an unreadable expression. But a smile quickly spread across his face again as he heard his enemy howling as he grappled with his skeletal minion. "Wrong death god," he told Sadie and started to turn away.

He didn't get very far. A forest of reeds sprung up right in front of him as if by magic. Before he could even take a step back more grew behind him, trapping him. Nico cursed and began hacking at the plants with his sword. Carter moved quickly to help, chopping at the reeds with his strangely curved sword.

"Look out!" Sadie shouted.

The next thing Percy knew, a woman had appeared and flung a handful of what looked like streamers at Nico. Within seconds he was tangled up in them like a fly in a spider's web.

"Good try, godling," the woman said, "but not good enough. Now I seal and banish you!"

The ribbons glowed with a soft light that looked almost holy, but Nico's scream of gut wrenching agony detracted from that illusion. Whatever color had been in the boy's skin to begin with fled, making his flesh so translucent that every vein was visible. His blood seemed to darken in them, and his pulse sped up dangerously. His eyes bulged and the vessels in them seemed to all burst at once, spilling black-tinged blood into the whites of his eyes. And throughout it all the boy kept screaming, horrible, pain filled cries, as though his heart was being cut right out of his chest with a plastic butter knife.

There was no doubt in Percy's mind that Nico was going to die.

"No!" he screamed and sat bolt upright in his bed. Sweat ran down his face, much like bloody tears had run down his cousin's. "Nico," he whispered and flung his legs over the side of his bed. He pulled on a pair of jeans and put a jacket on over his pajama shirt, then sprinted to the foyer of his apartment. He stepped into his shoes and paused only to check that Riptide was in his jacket pocket before running outside, determined to save his cousin.

But deep down, he knew that he was already too late.

* * *

I hope you liked the first chapter of my new fic! Next chapter, Nico's fate is revealed and we see what the Kanes think of their new ally. Please let me know what you think!


	2. Chapter 2

2

The pale boy's screams were horrible. Sadie had never heard anything like them before. The pain he must have been in to make them must have been unimaginable. Bloody tears spilled out of his eyes as he writhed in agony, and Sadie could take no more.

"Ha-di!" she screamed, targeting the ribbons. The streamer-like weapons exploded in a storm of unraveled threads. Mercifully the boy fell silent at their destruction. Sadie then turned on the magician who'd used the ribbons and gave a wicked smirk. "Turnabout is fair play," she told the woman, and pointed her wand. The hieroglyphics for "mummy" blazed in the air above the woman, and rolls of linen bandages appeared out of thin air and began wrapping the woman up like a spider's supper. Sadie cackled, proud of her spell. When she invented it, it had been half genius and half a joke. Pop culture about Egypt turned into a nonlethal offensive spell. She turned toward the other magician, who wasn't nearly as brave now that his magic jackal had been drug to hell, but found that her brother had beaten her to him.

Death Boy's skeletal minion seemed to have lost whatever magic that reanimated it when its master was taken out of the fight. It lay still now, still half buried in the earth, though one of its severed arms was still clamped around its foe's wrist, impeding the magician's movements as he tried to duel Carter.

Sadie wanted to go to Death Boy and make sure he was still breathing, but resisted the urge. Carter was still fighting. If he slipped up she needed to be ready to pick up his slack, not kneeling on the ground beside some anemic Yank.

But it seemed as though, for once, Carter didn't mess up. He dispatched their enemy with a shallow slice across his stomach that would make every movement painful, then rammed the pommel of his sword against the side of his enemy's head. The man dropped like a sack of bricks and Carter turned around.

They both hurried to Death Boy who lay still on the ground. Too still. And Sadie couldn't hear him breathing. His eyes were wide open and glazed with blood, and the veins in his face were visible through his too pale skin. He looked worse than the corpse that he'd summoned to fight for him and Sadie was almost positive that he was dead.

Carter reached out and held his hand over Death Boy's face, letting his fingers hover right over the kid's lips and below his nose. "He's breathing," he said with obvious relief. "He's alive."

"He doesn't look alive."

"Well he is," said Carter irritably. "And we need to get out of here." He stashed his sword in the Duat and picked Death Boy up bridal style.

"This is going to be real fun," muttered Sadie. "Running all the way to Brooklyn in the middle of the night. What do you think our chances of getting a cab are?"

Carter gave her a dour look. "I can't even get a cab during broad daylight, even without carrying a bleeding, unconscious necromancer. But I've got another idea. Follow me."

He began walking quickly, taking care not to shake Death Boy too much.

"This isn't the fastest way out of here," protested Sadie.

"If I remember right, there's a pond this way," Carter told her. "If we can summon a boat –"

"We can sail it right up beside the mansion! Brilliant!" Sadie gave her brother an excited punch in the arm. Carter stumbled and almost dropped Death Boy.

"Careful!" said Carter. Death Boy didn't complain though. He didn't move, not even a twitch. He just stayed as still as a corpse, staring sightlessly at the sky with his blood glazed eyes. Sadie felt a chill run down her spine and hoped that it was not a portent of things to come.

* * *

Percy "borrowed" his stepfather's car. It was an emergency after all. His friend was dying.

No. His friend was probably already dead. The image of Nico writhing in all consuming anguish was seared into his brain. If he was honest with himself, which he generally was, he worried about Nico more than he worried about anyone or anything else. Not that he had a whole lot to worry about these days. The world had been saved, the titans had been turned back, and there were no signs that the next Great Prophecy was going to be realized any time soon. His biggest problems were his English class at school, and the fact that he was one of the few people left in the modern world without a cell phone.

Honestly, he didn't think about Nico all that often, but when he did, it was usually with concern. The boy was his friend after all, and he really didn't have anyone else to worry about him. Hades may have become an infinitely better father to Nico than he used to be, but considering what he'd been before, that didn't necessarily mean all that much. Percy knew that Nico continued to train on his own rather than at camp. He'd heard from Grover that Nico came by every once in awhile to catch dinner or spend the night, but for the most part it seemed that he lived in the underworld. Percy didn't know how healthy that really was. True, Nico was the son of the god of death, but he was also half human and being around living things was pretty important to humans. More than that, there was no one around to watch over him and make sure he didn't overdo it with training and kill himself by burning out all his power, and no one around to make sure that he ate well enough . . . with the possible exception of his step-grandmother of sorts, though cereal alone wasn't a balanced diet. Nico probably avoided Demeter anyway, Percy guessed, and he knew for certain that Nico wasn't very health conscious. In his vision his friend looked like he'd lost weight, and the man from the House of Life who'd attacked him really couldn't be blamed for thinking Nico was anemic. The boy looked like he hadn't seen the sun in months.

Now he'd probably never see the sun again.

Percy took out Riptide before entering Central Park and kept it in his hand as he ran at full speed toward the location that he thought was the most probable that Nico's fight had occurred at. He hoped that the sight of the blade would put off the sort of people that would jump a kid for the five bucks in his pocket, and since no muggers approached him, it seemed to work well enough.

Central Park contained more than a square mile of space. If he hadn't had a general idea of the geographic features that Nico had been fighting near, trying to find him would have been like throwing darts in the dark, especially since he doubted Nico was in any shape to answer his shouts. He stuck near the south end of the park, where there were spots where the terrain was rocky and unleveled enough to fit the spot he'd seen in his dream. It took him less time than he thought it would to find the place, since he got lucky and it turned out to be in the first place he checked, but by the time he got there it was already too late. The battle sight was deserted.

There were no people around. No weird kids who'd dragged Nico into their fight, no weird House of Life sorcerers with giant jackals and magic streamers, and no son of Hades. Percy wasn't sure if that last one was a good thing or a bad thing.

_I was expecting to find his dead body, _Percy reminded himself. _Since it's not here, I mean since he's not here, then there's a chance he might still be alive. A good thing then_, he decided.

"Nico!" he shouted. "Nico are you out there?"

There was no reply, but he hadn't expected one. In his dream Nico hadn't looked like he'd be in any shape to reply to any call for at least a few hours, or maybe days. If he lived.

_Focus, _Percy told himself._ Nico's missing. Maybe dead, but that's not certain. I have to act like he'd alive. Which means that someone took him. Either those kids, Sadie and Carter, or the people from the House of Life. _

The best case scenario, he decided, was if those kids had taken Nico with them. Nico's display had obviously unnerved them a little, but they hadn't treated him like an enemy. Carter had tried to help him when he was being penned in by those fast-growing reed things, and had tried protect him from the male magician before he knew Nico had powers of his own. And Sadie had a wand so it stood to reason that she had some kind of power too.

If the House of Life freaks had overpowered Sadie and Carter then that would be the worst case scenario. It would mean that they had kidnapped Nico while he was unconscious and helpless, maybe even dying. But if they hadn't killed him immediately it must have meant they had some use for him. Percy remembered the man telling his jackal to kill Sadie and Carter but retrieve Nico. He felt a spark of hope at that.

Then he remembered Nico's comment about how many bodies were buried in shallow graves all around New York City. It would be bitter and ironic if Nico had become one of them.

_Search the scene,_ Percy told himself. _Look for clues. You've watched enough CSI to know what to do. _

And so he began scouring the area with the aid of the flashlight he'd taken from the glove compartment of Paul's car, looking for something that would help him find his friend.

Thankfully, there were no signs of overturned earth or digging anywhere in the vicinity. If the House of Life freaks had disposed of Nico's body they hadn't done it here at least. Percy said a quick prayer of thanks to his father, then another to Hestia, tagging on a request for her blessing in bringing Nico home.

What he did uncover was interesting to say the least. The plants that had grown out of nowhere to trap Nico and trip him up were unfamiliar to Percy. They were some sort of reed, he could tell, and they wouldn't live long where they were now since they weren't rooted in wetlands. He tore off a chunk of one and slipped it in his jacket pocket. Maybe it would prove useful in figuring out what sort of powers those freaks had.

There was also shredded fabric. Small red tufts that looked like they came from the streamers that had rendered Nico helpless. Somehow someone had reduced them to nothing more than tattered fibers. He was a bit reluctant to touch them, worried that they might still be dangerous, but he took a sample of them anyway, and just avoided letting it make contact with his skin. He needed every scrap of information that he could get right now and couldn't afford to pass up any clues.

Oddly enough, there was another type of fabric, this kind white and not reduced to threads like the red kind. It was still in long thin sheets, like ace bandages, and there was a lot of it. It was in pieces that were about a foot and a half or so long, as though it had been wrapped around something, or someone, and someone else had cut it off of them.

_Could this have been from a mummy?_ wondered Percy warily. It wasn't inconceivable. Not with the giant jackal and the magic weapons carved with hieroglyphics. There were definitely powers at work here that Percy knew nothing about.

Other than the strange fabrics, there was the corpse that Nico had summoned to fight for him, which seemed to have unanimated when its master was rendered unconscious, and, more disturbing, a pool of blood in the spot where Nico had fallen. If that wasn't bad enough on its own, Percy noticed something unusual about the blood when he shone the flashlight over it. Just like Nico's blood in his vision, this blood was darker than normal blood, and Percy was almost positive that it wasn't just a trick of the light.

_What is this? _he wondered._ A side effect of being Hades' son? Or something else?_

All he knew for certain is that this was something new. Nico's blood hadn't always been that color, he was positive. He remembered, quite vividly, a construction incident while the new cabins were being built at Camp Half-Blood. On one of the rare attempts that Nico made to mingle with the other campers and be normal, he had been holding boards in place while a son of Ares hammered them in place. That particular son of Ares had been showing off, making a big deal about how he could drive a nail all the way through a board with one hit of his hammer, and was being so obnoxious about it that everyone was getting tired of hearing him sing his own praises.

What finally shut him up was when he accidentally drove a nail through Nico's left hand instead of a board. Even if he'd tried to continue talking about how great his skills were, no one would have heard him as Nico screamed curses in Ancient Greek, English, and, perhaps because some latent memory had surfaced, Italian as well, while blood streamed freely from his hand even before the other campers had pulled the nail out. The Ares' son had managed to tap one of Nico's veins, which had been very painful as well as very, very messy. Percy could recall that incident with great clarity. He'd been one of the only people brave enough to go near the enraged son of Hades while he was swearing in three different languages, so it had fallen to him to bandage Nico's hand, rather than someone from Apollo's cabin who would have done a much better job. He hadn't wrapped it tight enough the first time, and only twenty minutes later, bright red blood was already seeping through the layers of bandages.

Bright red.

Not black tinged.

"Whatever it is," muttered Percy, "it can't be good."

He stood, trying to plan what his next move should be. It was a lot easier to come up with plans when he had more information about what he was up against and what he was trying to accomplish. "Save Nico and put the fear of the Greek gods into those House of Life freaks," sounded like it should be simple enough, but he had no idea who those freaks were or where they'd taken Nico if they even had him.

"I need more knowledge," said Percy. "I need to talk to someone who might know something about this." Luckily he knew where people like that were likely to be. And there was no time like the present to start heading that way.

Before he left something caught his eye. Something gunmetal black glittered from the pool of Nico's dark blood. Percy reached down and gingerly picked it up. He recognized it immediately and a bitter smile twitched on his lips. It was a tiny lead figurine of Hades, a miniature from the Mythomagic game that Nico once loved so much. That figure was the last thing that his sister had ever given him. Percy hadn't seen it since he'd convinced Nico to take it and had never spared much thought wondering what Nico did with it. Now he saw with his own eyes. A thin piece of black wire had been carefully wrapped around the miniature, looping at the top so that it could be strung on a necklace. A broken chain was threaded through the wire loop.

Percy clenched the broken necklace in his hand as he was assaulted by several unpleasant memories connected to the Hades figurine. "I won't fail this time, Nico," he vowed and started walking quickly back toward his car.

* * *

Carter was glad that his plan to summon the boat worked. Death Boy, as Sadie had taken to calling the pale necromancer kid, wasn't heavy, and Carter was fairly fit, but somehow . . . Carter couldn't really explain it. It was almost as if holding the boy was slowly sucking the life out of him. He would never have been able to carry him all the way to Brooklyn.

He was relieved when he was finally able to lay the pale kid down in one of their mansion's guest rooms.

"He looks bloody awful," said Sadie in her usual helpful manner.

Carter couldn't argue. Death Boy was still as pale as, well, death, and his veins were still dark and clearly visible. If he hadn't known better, he would've thought that he was looking at a statue made of marble. Or maybe not. No statue had eyes as disturbing as Death Boy's. They were still wide open and covered with a film of blood. Dark trails of the tacky liquid had dried on his face, spiraling out from around his eyes.

"He looks like one of HR Giger's nightmares," Carter muttered and walked across the room to the kitchenette. The guest room had the basic features that his and Sadies' rooms had, though the fridge and cabinets weren't stocked with food. Carter got a bowl and filled it with water then grabbed a couple towels before returning to were Sadie was studying their guest with great interest.

"You're not really going to give him a sponge bath, are you Carter?" Sadie wanted to know.

"What?" asked Carter. "No. Of course not. Do I look like a candy striper to you?"

"Do you really want me to answer that?"

Carter rolled his eyes and soaked one of the towels in the water. "I'm not giving him a sponge bath, I'm just going to wash the blood off his face. Maybe try to patch up the gash that he got hitting his head on the ground when you landed on him."

"You say that like it was my fault."

"It was your fault."

"Okay, maybe, but I didn't mean it."

"Still your fault."

"Shut up."

"Whatever," Carter told his sister. "I'm going to lift his head up. Slide the headrest under him, will you?"

Sadie did as he asked without arguing for once. Then she surprised Carter again by soaking a towel in the water and starting to dab it against Death Boy's head wound. He didn't say anything though, because he didn't want her to remember what a brat she was. He started swabbing Death Boy's face with his own towel, scrubbing away the blood.

"That's an improvement," said Sadie once all the ichor had been cleaned away.

"Somewhat," agreed Carter. The boy was still way too pale, his black veins were still freaky, and his eyes were still beyond creepy. "Wait. Should his eyes be open like that? Should we close them for him?"

Sadie shuddered. "I don't want to. That would be too much like closing a corpse's eyes like they do in the movies. Besides, if we closed them the way they are now the blood that's in them would probably cause all kinds of infection. Next time he tried to open them they'd probably be full of pus."

"Thank you for that wonderful mental image," muttered Carter. He lifted the bowl of water and held it aloft above the boy's face. "Put a clean towel against the side of his face. I'm going to try to flush the blood out of his eyes and I don't want the whole bed getting soaked."

That led to an argument about whether it would be better to do it Carter's way, or to put the towels below Death Boy's head, around the headrest. Carter gave in and let Sadie do it her way because it was easier than constantly bickering.

Once the film of blood over his eyes had been washed away, Death Boy definitely looked a whole lot less creepy. Carter carefully closed the boy's eyes with his finger tips and glared when Sadie called him morbid. "I don't care what you say," he told her, "if we just leave his eyes open they'll dry out and he'll go blind."

"How'd we get stuck taking care of a necromancer again?" Sadie asked, perching on the bed beside their guest and pulling her knees up to her chest. "He is a necromancer isn't he?" she asked after a moment. "He has to be."

"I think so too," agreed Carter. "But I doubt he really knows it."

"Don't be so stupid. You don't call up a rotting corpse and have it sick your enemies by accident," scoffed Sadie.

"I don't mean that he doesn't know what he's doing," returned Carter. "I meant that he probably doesn't know how he can do the things he does. You remember how he didn't know what the House of Life is? He probably figured out what he could do all on his own because . . . because his affinity must be for necromancy."

"Freaky-odd," said Sadie.

"Don't treat him like that when he wakes up," admonished Carter. "He didn't chose his affinity. Imagine how freaked out he must have been. Remember what we had to go through when we found out we could work magic and had gods inside of us?"

"Yeah, but he didn't have a god inside him."

"No, instead he woke up corpses. You're right. He really did have it so much easier."

"Whatever," huffed Sadie.

"More than that, look at him. Really look at him."

"I have looked at him," said Sadie. "I see an anemic Yank. Not impressed."

Carter scowled and gave Sadie his insights, using the skills he'd garnered from years of his father's anthropology and archeology lectures. "His skin is too tight around his cheek bones and his arms are rail thin. Signs of malnourishment. There are white spots on his nails which indicate he doesn't get enough calcium. Pale skin which is cold to the touch suggests anemia, like you said. These wouldn't be uncommon in a child from a poor family, or one who lived on the street, but there are things that contradict this conclusion."

Carter tugged one of Death Boy's boots off of his foot. "Like his clothes. His boots are well made and waterproof. His jeans are in good condition, and that jacket is Italian leather. Not sure how he manages to work magic so well wearing animal products, but that's not the issue. If we search his pockets we'll probably find a good amount of money. Hey! I didn't mean you should search his pockets!"

"We'll see if what you say has any merit," sniped Sadie. She turned Death Boy's jean pockets out and came up with nothing. With a smug smile on her face she proceeded to his jacket pockets, then her smirk faded. From one she pulled out two fat wads of cash. One of American twenty dollar bills, the other of twenty euro banknotes. In his other jacket pocket she found a handful of bright gold coins covered in odd symbols, and a gunmetal black switchblade. "What the bloody hell are these?" she asked, holding up one of the coins.

"Not Egyptian," was all Carter knew. He gave his sister a superior smirk before continuing with his educated guess as to what Death Boy's situation was. "All these point to him being from a wealthy family that doesn't give a damn about him. They buy him nice clothes because what he wears reflects on them. They make sure that he stays clean and well groomed, and gets his hair cut regularly so that he doesn't embarrass them. But other than that, they try to avoid him. He probably can't remember the last time he had a meal with his family because they don't want him there. They don't check to make sure that he eats his vegetables or drinks his milk. And if he decides to go for a walk at night in Central Park they're alright with it, because they're secretly hoping that he won't come home. And do you know why that probably is? Because they know what he can do and it scares the crap out of them. So maybe, when he wakes up, we should treat him like an ally who put his life on the line for us, facing down the House of Life. Not like a necromancer who we don't think is as good as us. We are looking for allies, remember? And alienating this kid doesn't seem like a good way to win him over to our side."

"Alright," promised Sadie, "I'll try not to treat him like the freaky-odd emo goth he is."

Carter sighed and pulled off Death Boy's, no, the kid's other boot. He needed to stop thinking of the necromancer in derogatory terms and that meant no using the rude but appropriate nickname Sadie had branded him with. He put the boots on the floor and stood up. "We should leave him in peace for awhile."

"So when do you think he's going to wake up?"

Carter shrugged. "He still looks like he's in pretty bad shape. It might be awhile."

* * *

Nico was in hell. Which is not to say that he had somehow been transported back to his father's realm. But it wasn't in the figurative sense either, even though he did have a headache that would have made being lobotomized seem tame, and a fiery burning in his chest that made every beat of his heart pure agony. He was literally in some form of hell. Or at least an afterlife, but nowhere in the afterlife of the Greek gods. He didn't even know how he knew this, but instinctively he did. Anyone else would have probably thought that they were in a tomb, on Earth, or maybe that they were dreaming. Nico knew very well that he was awake and in a place where only the dead were supposed to be, that was somehow foreign and alien to him as the realm of Hades never was.

"Who are you?" a voice demanded from the corridor behind him. "Or rather what are you?"

Nico spun toward the sound, trying not to wince as his skull threatened to shatter into a million pieces and his heart made a desperate escape attempt only to fall up short and smash against his ribs. "What in Dad's name are you supposed to be?" he asked, but even as the words left his lips he knew. "Anubis. Defense 2700, magic 3200, physical attacks 3500. Full resistance to necromancy."

Anubis stared at him for a moment and then changed. One minute he was a tall man with a black jackal's head, the next he was a boy in his mid teens who looked enough like Nico that he could have been his big brother. "Mythomagic," he said dryly. "That game got it all wrong, you know."

"Believe me, I know," Nico told him, feeling a bit of enthusiasm despite himself. "Hades' stats are majorly gimped compared to his real power. He should have full resistance to all undead, not just doubled defense against zombie units."

"Demigod," Anubis said, looking half amused, half wary. "A son of Hades, I presume?"

"Nico di Angelo," he introduced himself.

"You're not supposed to be here," Anubis told him.

"Point me toward the exit and I'll leave."

"I'm afraid it's not that easy," Anubis told him, now just weary and no longer amused.

"Why?" asked Nico warily. "You're going to try to stop me leaving?"

"If you had come here with your body, I would gladly escort you out and into any graveyard in the world that you liked. However . . ."

Nico looked down at his hands and realized that he could see through them, as though they were a hologram. "Oh man . . ."

"And now we are faced with a unique situation," Anubis said, not looking happy about it at all. "My pantheon has no jurisdiction over demigod souls-"

"Which is good because I doubt I'd pass your heart-feather-scale test."

"- but untethered souls cannot leave the Land of the Dead. Attempting to do so would burn out all the energy that makes up your very being. It wouldn't kill you; if you're here you're already dead. It would obliterate your soul."

"And if I tried to make my own way out?" Nico asked, wondering if it would be possible to shadow travel out of this place.

"You may try, but I doubt it will work."

Anubis was right. Nico focused on joining himself with the darkness but his powers didn't seem to be working. But his headache increased sevenfold and the pain in his chest drove him to his transparent knees. A cry of agony found its way to his lips, followed by something that sounded scarily like a sob.

"Nico?" Anubis didn't seem to know what to do. "Are you . . . okay?" He moved to stand in front of the demigod, hovering awkwardly. Nico tried to respond but another flash of pain rendered him silent. Anubis, looking as though he'd never made a comforting gesture before in his life, reached out tentatively to touch his shoulder. The moment his fingers made physical contact everything changed.

Neither the death god nor the demigod would be able to describe the situation later to anyone if they had tried. It felt almost like their souls had been fused together with white hot electricity. Anubis' godly energy melded with the energy that made up Nico's soul, and filled the raw, aching abyss of pain that was in his chest. Then something seemed to snap like a rubber band and shot Nico back into his own body, wherever it was.

Nico sat bolt upright and screamed; not in pain this time. Not quite in ecstasy either. The power that coursed through the veins of his half immortal body burned, like an adrenaline rush. For several scary seconds he didn't think that his body would be able to handle it and was certain that he was going to break apart, but the moment passed and the sense of danger subsided. The energy however remained.

A baboon that had been affixing a bandage to his arm screamed right back at him, then jumped backward and up and down in a fit.

"Huh! Wha? Monkey?" Nico asked, feeling drunk on power and too wired to think straight.

"Monkey? You pass out for a week and that's the first thing you can think of to say when you wake up?" a voice with a British accent asked.

Nico turned his head toward the speaker and quickly took in her appearance. It was a girl, a little younger than him probably, but taller than he would be when he was standing. It took him a moment to remember where he'd seen her and what had happened, but only a moment. "What happened to that hag with the burning ribbon things?" was his immediate concern.

The girl smirked. "I gave her a taste of her own medicine. I devised a clever little spell that summons linen bandages and wraps my target up like a mummy."

"Spell," he muttered. Then words came into his mind unbidden. _Sadie is a powerful magician who honors the old ways._

Nico's jaw dropped as he recognized the voice. "Anubis?" he asked, looking from side to side for the death god, even though deep down he knew that the voice was only in his head.

"I know Anubis," said Sadie cautiously. "But we can talk about him later. Who are you? And how did you do . . . whatever it was you did back in the park?"

Nico only half heard her. _You're in my head,_ he thought at Anubis, hoping that the god would hear him so that he didn't have to talk out loud and start sounding like a schitzophrenic.

_Somehow_, Anubis confirmed. _It seems that you're rather well suited to be a vessel. A little too well suited, actually._

_ Vessel? What? Are you . . . possessing me?_

_ It appears so, though this was never my intention,_ Anubis told him.

"Hullo? Death Boy? Are you listening to me?" Sadie was waving a hand in front of his face, trying to get his attention.

"Cut him a break, Sadie," said the boy who Nico had seen in the park the other night. _Carter_, Anubis supplied when he drew up a blank on the boy's name, though he knew he had heard it. "Here," said Carter, holding out a mug of something that smelled like Nilla wafers. "You must be thirsty."

Nico took the cup, but Carter kept a hand out, steadying it because his hands were shaking. Not shaking because they were weak, but more because of an excess of energy flowing through them, like when he got really buzzed off of caffeine. He sipped the warm liquid inside the mug cautiously, then threw caution to the wind after the first taste and downed the rest in several gulps. "It's good," he told Carter. "What was it?"

_Sahlab_, Anubis told him only a second before Sadie gave him the exact same answer. "Sahlab. It's kind of like hot chocolate, only it's vanilla instead of chocolate."

"I didn't ask you," Nico told Anubis.

"Well excuse me!" said Sadie.

"No, not you," Nico hurried to clarify. "The voice in my head. Wait. I shouldn't have said that, I didn't mean it like that –"

"Voice in your head?" asked Carter, catching on immediately. "Are you the host of a god then?"

"No," Nico told him, but then Anubis seemed to wrest control of his body from him. "Yes," Anubis told them using Nico's lips and Nico's voice. "I have somehow gotten part of my soul stuck in this demigod's body."

"Demigod?"

"Who are you?"

Both Kane siblings spoke at once.

"It's me, Sadie." Anubis chose to address the girl for some reason. "Anubis. And this boy is Nico di Angelo, son of Hades, the Greek god of the dead."

_Thanks a lot for respecting my privacy and not revealing my identity. Why don't you tell them my elemental weakness and how many HP I have left while you're at it?_

Sadie and Carter seemed to start to relax when he introduced himself, but tensed again as he introduced Nico.

"He's the son of a god?" Sadie asked. "So that makes him a god too?"

"No. He is a demigod."

"Like Hercules, from the Disney movie," Carter tried to explain to his sister.

Nico's temper flared and he managed to wrest control of his mouth back. "Speak not of that travesty!" he managed to shout before Anubis got control back.

"My host is not very fond of that movie or its portrayal of his father," he said drily.

_That gibbering moron is not fit to be called even a portrayal of my father! It was even worse than the Clash of the Titans remake!_

"What I would like to know," Anubis said to the Kanes, "is how his soul came to be in my domain. Even with my power added to him it took him . . . a week you said? A week for his soul to return and fit back into his own comatose body."

"Comatose?" Carter looked shocked and guilty. "Er, sorry Nico. I mean we were hoping that it was just a deep sleep. And it was actually only four days, not a whole week."

_Four days, _Nico thought glumly. He hated losing time. After losing close to sixty years in the Lotus Hotel and Casino he was reluctant to even nap during the day and let time pass him by.

"What happened before that?" prompted Anubis.

"Well, we were in Central Park, running from a couple magicians from the House of Life," explained Sadie. "We ran into Death Boy – er, I mean Nico-"

"She actually landed on top of him."

"Shut up, Carter! Anyway, we ran into him and the magicians caught up to us. The guy tried to send Death Boy home using a touch of hypnotism, but Death Boy resisted it and was able to see through the veil and knew that the magician's familiar was a jackal, not a wolf or a dog. So the magician assumed that Death Boy –"

"My name is Nico!"

"Right. Assumed that Nico was a magician that we were recruiting and sicked his pet Cujo on us. But Death Boy, I mean Nico, opened up some kind of rift in the ground and the jackal got sucked into it along with some flames."

_He's a chew toy for Cerberus by now,_ Nico couldn't help thinking with a small touch of glee.

"Then the other magician appeared," Carter took over. "She bound Nico with the Ribbons of Hathor and tried to banish him."

"I see," said Anubis. "That must have been it."

"What must have been it?" both Kanes asked out loud, while Nico asked the same question in his mind.

"The magician tried to banish any traces of divinity in his body," explained Anubis. "The ribbons of Hathor are intended to expel a god from his human host. It banishes the divine energy inside of the human and leaves the vessel in tact. But half of Nico's genetic makeup is divine. To banish the essence of divinity in him would be equivalent to dissecting him on the cellular level, or trying to unravel his genes and eliminating any traces of his father's DNA."

_Greek gods don't have DNA, stupid._

Anubis ignored the insult. "But that alone would not have been enough to hurt most demigods. Hathor's power stems from life, and most of the powers of the Greek gods are linked to some form or element relating to life. In a sense, it would usually be like literally fighting fire with fire. Rather ineffective. But Hades powers are all linked to death, so in this case it was like fighting fire with water. It all but snuffed out his life. Hathor's power cast his soul into the Egyptian Pantheon's netherrealms, and left him stranded before the Hall of Judgment," continued Anubis. "He collapsed while attempting to use his demigod powers. When I went to check and see if he was alright, I touched him and somehow part of my soul was embedded into his. It seems that he is my vessel now, whether I want this or not. I can't seem to separate from him."

_What? You're stuck here with me?_

_Not twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, _Anubis told him._ The gods of my pantheon have the power to be in several places at the same time. Right now the majority of my soul is still in the Hall of Judgment, weighing the hearts of the dead. I intend to return my consciousness there as soon as we have sorted this situation out. I just am not able to completely withdraw all of my power from you, and will be able to hear your thoughts when you think them loud enough._

_ And take me over like this again?_ demanded Nico. He didn't like the feeling of being a prisoner in his own body. Only someone who was crazy or really freaking stupid would.

_Not unless it seems necessary. _Anubis gave a sort of mental sigh._ I'm sorry for this, but unless I had intervened, this confusion could have gone on for hours. I wanted to get this sorted as quickly as possible, and Sadie and Carter know me. This way was faster. _

_ When can I have my body back?_

_ In a few minutes._

"So does that mean you're here with us now?" Sadie asked sounding eager. "You're welcome to stay here with us. There's plenty of rooms here."

"Nico is not any happier at the idea of me possessing him than the two of you were when you found out that Horus and Isis were residing in you," Anubis told her evenly and Sadie looked sheepish. "I do not intend to interfere more than I have to. I think that Nico will need your hospitality for a few days, however. This body feels extremely weak and fragile."

_Hey!_

"Probably because it has gone without food, or water, or a soul residing in it for four days. Even after being infused with divine power he will still need rest. Can I trust you to look after my vessel in my absence?"

"Of course," said Sadie enthusiastically.

"We owe you one for helping us with that feather," Carter said, a bit more practically. "And we owe him since we got him into this mess. We'll look after him."

_I don't need a babysitter,_ Nico grumbled.

"Thank you, Carter. Sadie." Anubis bowed slightly to Carter then turned to Sadie. Nico felt the corners of his mouth curl into a smile, though he personally had nothing to be smiling about, and his eyes lingered on Sadie longer than was necessary. "Until we meet again," Anubis said, and Nico suddenly felt like something was tugging at a loose thread in his soul, pulling it so far that the threads surrounding it began to unravel. He felt Anubis's consciousness and the wellspring of his power at the far end of that thread, leaving him alone in his own head again. Nico opened his mouth to tell Sadie and Carter exactly what they could do with their promise to babysit him . . .

. . . and promptly passed out.

* * *

Wow, this is the longest thing I've ever written for fun (I've written some longer school papers but they're not fun). I hope that you like what I've written so far. I tried to keep everyone in character the best that I could. Sorry if I slipped up anywhere with that.

In the next chapter Nico discovers some drastic changes to his body that have absolutely nothing to do with puberty, and we see what Percy has been up to at Camp Half-Blood.


	3. Chapter 3

3

Hades was not a happy god.

Hades was never a happy god, but now he was more pissed off than usual. His only son going missing, and all signs showing that he'd been abducted by the thrice damned House of Life had a tendency to get on his nerves like nothing else had managed to in the past two millennia.

_"There will be blood!"_ Hades roared when he found that he was being blocked out of his son's mind by an alien power, which confirmed his suspicions that Nico had been kidnapped.

It had started when he found Cerberus chewing on a jackal.

Jackals weren't very common in Hades' realm. Not normal jackals and not magical jackals either. They were associated with death, yes, but not really part of any Greek lore. So finding a giant jackal that was obviously the familiar of some upstart House of Life magician was the first sign that something strange was afoot.

After a short but undignified tug of war match with his three headed guard dog, Hades managed to obtain the mangled jackal. It was a sorry sight, but there were still a few clues that it could reveal to him. The hieroglyphics that were inscribed beneath its skin let Hades know exactly who the mangy beast belonged to, much more efficiently than one of those modern day computer chips that pet owners used to track errant animals. Hades could have sent the jackal familiar back to its owner with no more effort than it took to snap his fingers, if he'd a mind to. Which he didn't. He'd never been a very charitable god, and more than that, he found something else of interest on the jackal, or rather around it.

His son's signature magic was distinct. All of Hades' children had their own variations of his magic. He could tell each one apart even more easily than he could by their faces. Nico's had actually been the hardest for him to pin down. It was annoying because even after several years of being able to recognize it, he couldn't tell whether his son's power was strong or weak. The first dozen or so times he'd felt his son's powers, they'd felt subpar. Weak and sluggish. And so he'd assumed that Nico was weak and sluggish as well as small of stature, dim witted, and naïve. Then Nico went and dug a hole in one of Persephone's flower beds, used his magic and blasted through every one of the many iron clad wards that Hades had erected around the area of his domain that housed his deceased family and all memories and magic relating to them. That was something that even Zeus would have barely been able to manage, and Hades had to wonder if his son had been deliberately holding back his powers all this time, tricking everyone, including his own father into underestimating him, and playing up the illusion of frailty that his body presented.

Hades still didn't know whether Nico was weak or strong, but he'd begun to suspect it was actually the latter. The trace magic that he left behind every time he used his powers deteriorated fast, so anyone looking at his handiwork would think he was weak and impotent, but now Hades realized that could have been deliberate. But whichever it was, he could see that Nico's residual power clung to the jackal and let him know that his son had been responsible for the mangy beast's impromptu trip to Hades.

Unlike the majority of Hades' children, Nico was actually quite sane. More than that though, he took after his mother. He was polite and decent and much too sincere for his own good. The sort of hero who the world could look at and admire, if not for the fact that he called up the dead, which all mortals considered a turn off. But that aside, Nico was a good boy, and further away from being cruel than any of Hades' other sons. (who usually tended to go off on the deep end) Nico didn't torture small animals or pull the wings off of flies. On the contrary, he seemed to actually like animals, especially cute furry ones. (though he tried to hide this fact from his father) He wouldn't have sent a magician's jackal familiar to get chewed up by Cerberus for his own amusement. He would have only sent it to Hades' realm if it had attacked him.

Which meant, Hades realized with mounting rage, that the House of Life had attacked his son.

He'd immediately tried to get in contact with Nico, to make sure that this insult had been properly dealt with. His summons had not only gone unanswered, it had failed to even reach his son. So Hades had tried again, and when it failed to work the second time, cast a wider net. He manually checked the Hades Cabin at Camp Half-Blood in case it was the camp's pesky defenses that were turning back his messages, since his powers were the sort of thing most half-bloods needed protection from. But the Hades Cabin was empty and lacked any of the typical signs that Nico's nests contained, such as the Mythomagic cards and figurines he'd begun collecting again, candy bar and fast food wrappers filling the wastebasket, and the most recently released Happy Meal toys lined up with almost OCD meticulousness. Hades would never admit that he actually found his son's quirks to be almost . . . well, cute, but he wouldn't deny that their absence caused him to feel a disturbed pang of worry in his chest.

Growing desperate, he had tried an extreme measure; connecting directly with his son's mind, which always worked, without fail, but would give Nico one heck of a nosebleed and put his eardrums out of commission for a week and a half. That had never failed before. Hades could always, always reach his own children through their minds, but now he found the path to Nico thoroughly blocked by an alien power.

That was when Hades actually began to get worried.

The House of Life had an unofficial agreement with the Greek gods and their progeny. They left each other alone. The House of Life had its own problems, the Greek pantheon had theirs. Their policy of noninterference had been in effect for centuries, and had worked well, aside from one or two mishaps involving some overzealous philosophers and a museum curator who thought he was the reincarnation of Cleopatra, but those are entirely different stories. The House of Life's magic was incapable of banishing the Greek pantheon. They had realized long ago that it was best to deal with the enemies they could defeat, and leave those they couldn't alone. So why they had chosen now of all times to break their agreement, Hades could not fathom. But it was becoming more and more obvious that they had. And not only that, but they had kidnapped Hades' only living son!

Chance encounters between magicians and demigods weren't unheard of. They actually weren't all that uncommon either, and happened at least once a century. An over eager magician would try to incinerate a demigod, a demigod would think a magician was a monster and run it through with a spear. That was normal. Those incidents quickly got cleared up with little or no fanfare. Mistakes happened after all, and these were indeliberate breaches of their unspoken treaty.

Kidnapping a son of Hades was definitely not an indeliberate breach of the treaty, but it was definitely a mistake. A really big mistake.

The House of Life was going to pay.

* * *

When Nico awoke again he was alone.

_Thank Hades,_ he thought, slowly sitting up. There were no magicians or monkeys in the room with him, and no god inside his skull. He could still feel the connection to Anubis, but it was very different from the feeling of being reduced to nothing more than a puppet while someone else pulled his strings.

Nico started to turn, preparing to swing his legs off the bed but something tugged painfully at his arm. He frowned down at what looked like a piece of tape connecting a plastic tube to his arm. The plastic tube, in turn, was connected to a bag of clear liquid hanging from the top of a high backed chair. _An IV,_ he realized. _Or a sodium pentathol drip._ But considering how willingly Anubis had spilled his secrets to the other kids, Nico doubted they'd have thought it necessary to drug him with truth serum. Then a memory that was just as disturbing as the knowledge that he was possessed by a god crossed his mind. He seemed to remember that screaming monkey doing something to his arm the last time he'd woken up. Sadie and Carter . . . they wouldn't have let their monkey hook him up to an IV, would they?

Scowling, Nico pulled off the bandage tape and pulled the needle beneath it out of his arm. Then he stood, a bit shakily, but managed to stay on his feet.

Using his powers to travel through shadows and leave this place, wherever this place was, wasn't an option. He was too weak and would probably end up taking another unplanned trip to China if he tried. And that was the best case scenario. Resigned to the fact that he was stuck here, for now at least, Nico took in his surroundings. The room he was in was huge. The bed was bigger than some of the cars that he'd seen, covered with white cotton sheets, and instead of a pillow there was an odd headrest, like the ones used in Egyptian tombs for mummies, and which explained the creak in Nico's neck. The floor was a reddish hardwood that had been polished until it was as reflective as a mirror, and was the only dark thing in the room. The walls were white. The ceiling was white. The doors and curtains were white.

Once again, Nico was in hell.

_Too much white,_ he thought, squinting against its brightness. It was night, he could tell, but he had his father's eyes. He could see in pitch black and so the lack of light did nothing to cover up all the oppressive white.

He made his way across the room, to a counter and found that it had been concealing a kitchenette. White refrigerator, stove, and veneer on the counter top, of course. The bloody microwave was white too, but at least the presence of appliances stopped the place from feeling so much like a cell in a mental institution.

Nico opened the fridge and found that someone had stocked it, presumably for him, since there were perishables that hadn't gone bad inside. In it he found several pint size cartons of milk, a couple of sandwiches that were stuffed ridiculously full of cold cuts and vegetables, and a huge bowl of fruit salad. All healthy crap. The kind of junk Percy Jackson's mother tried to make him eat on the occasions that he allowed Percy to talk him into coming over for Sunday dinner. But at least Miss Sally had the decency to have something unhealthy and artificially colored on hand for desert.

He was hungry enough that he devoured two of the sandwiches and gulped down a pint of milk. When he went to wash the juice from the sandwiches' tomatoes off his hands he realized that it had been quite some time since he'd bathed. He'd been unconscious four days before he woke up the first time. He wasn't sure how long had passed since he'd blacked out again, but now that he was aware of it, he could feel how stiff his clothes were from sweat, and in some places, blood.

There was a bathroom connected to his room, and he was relieved to see that the walls in it were beige instead of white. There was no shower head, but there was a big stone bathtub that was large enough to drown in. Someone had left towels for him on a shelf. Fluffy white towels, and a fluffy white bathrobe that almost made Nico burst a blood vessel. It was almost like the magicians were trying to piss him off. And to cap it all off, he found a change of clothes right next to the bathrobe. Some sort of middle eastern garments that looked like a cross between a martial arts gi and a set of pajamas. White, of course, damn them.

Nico resolved to wash his current set of clothes in his bath water, ring them out, and wear them while they dried. He turned the faucet on and stripped off his shirt, wincing as his muscles protested the movement, and as the dried blood and sweat stung his skin like the glue on a bandaide when it was removed too quickly.

It was only by chance that he happened to glance at his reflection in the full length mirror that covered the back of the door. Nico was far from vain after all. He knew that he wasn't anything special to look at, being as pale and skinny as he was. He had no muscles and no cool scars that would merit a second glance, and in his own opinion his face was still too childlike for him to look at it without getting annoyed about how low his intimidation stats would be if Mythomagic decided to make a Nico di Angelo card or miniature. So he almost didn't notice that anything was different at first glance. But a large black blotch on his corpse pale flesh stood out too much and caught his attention. Nico faced the mirror squarely and stared at his reflection, then looked down at his chest to make sure that he was really seeing what he was seeing.

_What. In. Hades?_

There was a black stone scarab about the size of Nico's fist embedded right in the center of his ribcage, right over his heart. Feather-covered wings that were anatomically incorrect for a scarab, spread from either side of the beetle and a sun-disk was directly above the scarab, held in its pincer-like mandibles.

He put his fingertips to it tentatively, expecting it to be cold to the touch like his own skin, but to his surprise it was warm. Not just warm. Hot. Like sand in the freaking Sahara Desert. And it had a pulse. A pulse that was perfectly aligned with his own, he realized after experimentally putting two fingers to his jugular to feel the beating there. Feeling an irrational surge of anger, Nico grabbed the scarab and tried to slide his fingers under the edges, but couldn't seem to find any. Then he tried pulling the skin around it away from it, hoping to dislodge it that way, but that didn't work either. Finally, he grabbed it with both hands and yanked as hard as he could.

White hot pain sent Nico stumbling into the mirror, forcing him to let go of the stone. He clenched his jaw against the pain and felt hot tears spring into his eyes. Trying to tear the damn scarab off his chest hurt worse than anything he'd ever felt before. _Anything_.

_I wasn't tearing it off my chest, _he realized with mounting horror._ I was tearing it _out_ of my chest. This . . . _thing_ . . . it's where my heart is supposed to be! My heart has been replaced by a chunk of stone!_

For a moment Nico couldn't breathe. All he could do was watch as his reflection gaped at him in horrified shock, face twisted cruelly because of the pain. It took a little while for him to get the pain under control. Once he did, he wiped the back of his hand across his face to get rid of the tears in his eyes, then focused on the alien presence that was tethered to the edges of his consciousness.

_ANUBIS!_ He screamed in his mind as loud as he could. _Anubis, you intro pack reject! Come here right now! _

There was a flash of surprise from the other end of the mental link that he shared with the god, then the feeling that he got when someone opened a door after he'd knocked or rang a doorbell.

_What's going on?_ Anubis asked in his mind.

_What in Dad's name is that?_ demanded Nico, pointing at his reflection, his finger jabbing the reflected image dead in the center of the black stone scarab's back.

_It looks like a scarab._ Nico could feel Anubis' interest, but could tell the god was not overly impressed.

_I know it's a scarab! _he shouted. _What I want to know is who in Hades gave you the right to replace my heart with a gods damned rock!_

_What? _Anubis was doubtful._ Replaced your heart . . ._

_ Feel,_ Nico ordered, and touched one hand to the scarab and the other to his throat again.

_It has a pulse, _Anubis realized._ And it's in sync with your own. But there is no way that it could have replaced your heart Nico._

_Oh yes there is._

_No, there's not. You'd be dead if someone took out your heart and put a stone scarab in its place, even if the scarab did have a pulse._

_ You'd think that, _telepathed Nico angrily, _wouldn't you?_

Anubis gave the mental equivalent of rolling his eyes. _Watch then, _he ordered_._

Nico felt control of his body being torn away. _Wait. No!_

It was too late. Anubis wasted no time trying a more gentle way of separating the scarab from his body, as Nico had done. He grabbed the stone with both hands and tried to pry it loose with as much strength as Nico's muscles could provide.

Pain even worse than what Nico felt earlier burned through his system and through the mental link he had with Anubis. He heard Anubis' scream in his head, and felt his lips twisting as though he meant to give voice to it, but no sound came out. So he avoided sounding like a pansy, but didn't manage to stay on his feet this time. The floor flew up to smack him in the face, and Nico noted, with more than a little annoyance, that the floor was made of white stone tiles.

_What is that thing?_ demanded Anubis once he'd recovered.

Nico didn't answer. He needed a little more time before he could put together coherent thoughts.

_Nico?_ asked Anubis a bit more gently when he realized what sorry state his host was in. _Are you alright?_

Nico managed to think one word clearly enough to telepath to the parasite god. _Hurts_.

_I'm sorry. I didn't know that trying to remove it would . . . I'm sorry. _

Nico didn't bother trying to respond to that. It was hard enough just to breathe. _What is it? _he asked again when he finally had a modicum of control.

_I don't know, _admitted Anubis._ I've never seen anything like . . . well I've never seen anything that would do that before. In ancient times, during the embalming process –_

_ You people would put stones carved into scarabs over a mummy's heart,_ Nico remembered. _I researched death lore and customs from every major society in history after I learned I was the son of a death god._ He managed to cough, the first physical sound he'd made since Anubis' attempt to remove the scarab. His chin clonking against the ugly white floor didn't count.

_You are right about the scarabs being put over a mummy's heart, _Anubis told him._ But that was in the earlier days. Later it became the practice to actually remove the heart from the mummy and replace it with a stone scarab._

_ Whose bright idea was that?_ demanded Nico. _I'll hunt their soul down and drag it to Tartarus for this._

_ I cannot say exactly when the tradition changed._

_ Why not? Aren't you supposed to be the Ancient Egyptian god of desecrating the dead in the name of embalming? _

_ Your thoughts could be considered blasphemy, you know._

_ I know. I just don't care. I'm the son of Hades, remember? Do you really think I'm going to fall down on my knees and worship you and your pantheon of fools? My dad could squash you, your scales, and your pet croco-dog like you were all bugs._

_ You had best hope that he does not attempt to do so,_ Anubis cautioned the young demigod. _The consequences of that would be dire._

Nico stilled his thoughts for a moment. He didn't want to admit that Anubis was right but he could hardly hide his thoughts from someone who was inside of his head. _You do know that this isn't going to go over well, don't you? _he asked when he managed to unmuddle his train of thought.

_What?_

_ This. You possessing me. Me having the power of another pantheon's death god at my disposal. No one from the Greek Pantheon is going to like it._ Nico gave a mental chuckle. _My dad will be furious out of principle. Not because he really cares about me, but because he'll see you as infringing on what belongs to him. Zeus and Poseidon won't be happy either if they find out. They'll see this as an alliance between two death gods. They'll think that my dad himself was responsible for me becoming your puppet._

_ It is not my intention to use you as a puppet._

_ They won't see it that way, _Nico cautioned him. _They can't find out. If they do there will be big trouble. Search my memories if you don't believe me. Zeus killed my mother trying to get to Bianca and me. Poseidon is a bit more level headed and fair, but he wouldn't be able to ignore the threat that you and my father would pose if you were allies. This is assuming that Father doesn't go on a rampage and try to destroy your entire pantheon the moment he finds out I'm possessed. It is possible that he'd kill me himself to keep you from using me._

Anubis could see his thoughts and knew that Nico was not lying to him. Their telepathy seemed to go both ways. Nico could sense how troubled Anubis was by these revelations. More than that, he could feel that Anubis really didn't want this. He hadn't wanted to take a human host, and wanted a complicated demigod host even less than he wanted another Roman Empire to rise. He really didn't have any intentions of using Nico as a medium in the mortal world. No plans for power plays against any other gods. If he could have withdrawn all of his power from Nico and cut the boy free, he would have. That surprised Nico. He was used to people trying to use him. Everyone did and always had, trying to manipulate him to their advantage, never really giving a care about his well being or what happened to him. Everyone was like that . . . except . . . except Percy.

_Oh no,_ Nico realized as his memory was jogged. _Oh . . . oh, Hades._

_? _Anubis sent a wordless query across their link.

_Percy,_ Nico tried to explain. _My . . . friend. My only real friend. He saw what happened in Central Park. _

_He was there?_

_ No, not there. He was spirit walking. Unconsciously using astral projection. It happens to demigods when we dream._

_ Oh. Like sending your spirit out as a ba bird._

Nico, having studied that part of Egyptian death lore, actually knew what Anubis meant. _Yes. Sort of, I guess. Anyway, Percy saw. He'll be worried. He's the only one in the world who would actually try to find me, and when he decides to do something . . . well, no one who's gone against him has ever won when he's fighting for something that really mattered to him. _

_ And you matter to him._

_ I don't know why. But yeah. Somehow, I do._

_ You are kinsman though, are you not? _asked Anubis, browsing over some of Nico's relevant memories that were fairly close to the surface.

_Our fathers are brothers. That makes us parallel cousins. I have one other parallel cousin in this generation . . . Thalia . . . a handful of cross cousins, and more second cousins than I can count. But for demigods extended family really doesn't mean anything. Our gods don't have DNA, so we're really not related. The only ones who might count are your siblings, and even then . . . even then, not usually._

_ Yet your cousin Percy looks out for you._

_ Yeah . . . He always has. _Nico felt ashamed remembering how much of a brat he'd been to Percy after Bianca died. And Percy had still tried to watch out for him, and had risked way too much to save him. For awhile he'd tried to make it up to Percy and get them back to even so that he wouldn't be in debt, but somewhere along the line it had stopped mattering who owed who what. Somehow they'd just become friends.

_You are fortunate,_ Anubis told him.

_I know._ Nico tried to pick himself up off the floor now that his thoughts were coming clearer. It took four tries before he managed to get to his hands and knees. _I need to go find him. Let him know I'm all right._

_ You're in no shape to go anywhere right now._

_ Whose fault is that? _demanded Nico.

_Even if I hadn't attempted to remove the scarab, you were weak before. You should wash up and then rest again. Your body is still very weak._

_ I am not weak,_ Nico thought angrily.

_Compared to your usual strength you are._

Nico crawled toward the tub, which was almost full now. _I'll get a bath. Then I need to find a way to contact Percy. If I don't he's going to cause an inter-pantheon incident trying to save me. And even if that wasn't a certainty, I owe it to him to give him peace of mind, at least._

_ Very well. I will leave it up to your discretion._

_ Good. Now leave my head while you're at it, if you don't mind. I'm not getting a bath while there's someone else in my skull. _

* * *

Percy had had a rough four days, since Nico disappeared. And the worst part of it was that no one but him seemed to really care.

He thought that people had gotten passed their prejudices against Nico being the son of Hades. Everyone had wanted to be his best friend after the battle at the foot of the Empire State building, when Nico showed up with his father and an army of zombies and turned the tides in their favor. But now everyone either seemed to have forgotten about that or thought that Nico would be fine on his own.

Chiron, who Percy had expected more from, was certain that Nico was alright. But he hadn't seen Nico writhing in the thrall of those damned ribbons with blood streaming out of his eyes like ink. He was willing to share what little he knew about the House of Life with Percy though he didn't seem to think it was necessary.

"They're based in Egypt, but have influence throughout all of Africa and plenty of Europe. They don't have a lot to do with North America because there's not a lot here for them. And they know that we're here and they try to avoid us. We don't cause problems for them, but if we wanted to there wouldn't be a thing they could do about it," he'd explained. "Their magicians are for the most part normal humans with a few tricks up their sleeve, but not much else. The gods their ancestors worshiped are from different planes than our pantheon. Despite what certain scholars believe, our gods and theirs have never overlapped. When Egypt fell to the Roman Empire, the House of Life blamed their gods for their own shortcomings and turned on them. They've spent the last two thousand years busy imprisoning their gods and keeping them imprisoned."

"Well now it looks like they're moving on to Greek gods," Percy had responded to Chiron angrily.

"That's very unlikely for several reasons, Percy. Hundred of years ago a few attempts were made by the House of Life to banish Greek gods the same way they banished their own, but it never worked. Their power, in its rawest form, isn't harmful to our gods."

"But Nico's a demigod," Percy had argued, "and it sure as heck hurt him."

"Perhaps he was bluffing in your dream," Chiron suggested. "I promise you, their power cannot banish our gods and would be just as ineffective at trying to banish demigods. You all are anchored in this world by your mortal parents' genes after all. You have just as much right to be here as the House of Life's magicians. And even if they discovered some way to harm demigods, it's unlikely they would pick now to start a war. They have been having rather a lot of problems with their own pantheon escaping banishment, these past few months."

Annabeth had been preoccupied with her architecture projects and hadn't been any more willing to believe. "You worry too much about Nico, Percy," she told him when he went to her for help. "There's no need for it. You know what he can and will do to anyone who threatens him."

"You didn't see him," Percy had told her. "These House of Life freaks had Nico dead." He'd quickly rephrased as a chill ran down his spine when he realized his wording. "I mean they had him nailed. Whatever they did to him took all the fight out of him. He's hurt, Annabeth. I don't know where he is, but he knew I was watching, and if he hasn't contacted me to let me know he's okay it's because he can't."

So since the gathering knowledge part of his plans hadn't worked out very well, and the taking action part couldn't really come until he had a destination or a specific person to take action against, he'd resorted to some pitiful attempts at hunting Nico's kidnappers down himself.

The internet had been even less helpful than the people at Camp Half-Blood. Of course all he'd had to go on for the kids who might have been holding Nico was their first names and the fact that Sadie was British, and searches for the House of Life turned up a big fat nothing.

His next action was even more useless, and was taken up mainly because he couldn't just sit around doing nothing. He'd called up Blackjack after returning Paul's car and had spent three days flying around New York, particularly in the Central Park area, looking for any signs of anything suspicious, and keeping a particularly close eye on the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which he knew had some Egyptian artifacts in it, and big stone obelisk that was in the park.

As he'd expected, nothing had turned up. At the end of each day he'd returned to camp and struggled to fall asleep. For once he was hoping for dreams, because they were the most likely thing he had to link him to his friend, and since they came stronger at camp, he had a better chance at finding Nico if he could fall asleep there. His mother wasn't too happy about him missing school, but Percy didn't think it occurred to her for a moment to try to stop him after he'd explained the situation to her and Paul.

Sally found Nico particularly endearing, to the point where Percy was certain she made Nico uncomfortable. Her mothering instincts seemed to go up a few notches whenever poor motherless Nico was around, and frankly Percy was surprised that Nico hadn't freaked out completely and run away from her apartment, never to return. He really couldn't believe that he managed to successfully talk Nico into coming over for Sunday dinner at least once a month, every month, since camp had ended last summer.

Percy really was trying hard to fall asleep the night he finally got contact from Nico. Unfortunately for him, though he was thankful a few minutes later, he was well aware that the harder someone tries to fall asleep, the more likely it is that they'll stay awake. If he'd been even a little drowsy at all, he might have missed the soft but urgent voice coming from the saltwater fountain in his cabin.

"Percy? Percy!"

Percy sat up, immediately alert. He recognized that voice. "Nico?"

"Percy, can you hear me?"

He saw his fountain glowing an eerie reddish color and wasted no time rushing to it and crouching down to peer in the mist. "Nico, is that you?"

Nico's face appeared, though it seemed slightly distorted, like Percy was seeing him through a thick piece of glass. But he still looked a whole lot better than the last time Percy had seen him. The black veins that had been visible through his translucent skin were gone now, and his hair wasn't matted with blood anymore. It was a bit damp and hung lank around his face. His shirt was wet too, and very wrinkled, and his jacket was missing. There were dark shadows under his eyes, like he was exhausted, and he looked like he might collapse at any time. He was very, very far away from healthy, but he gave a tired smile when he saw Percy. "Thank Iris," he said. "I didn't really think this would work."

"Nico, are you okay?" demanded Percy.

"Mostly," answered Nico.

Mostly was good enough for now, as far as Percy was concerned. Alive was better than he'd expected. They could fix whatever was wrong later, after he found his cousin. "What happened? Where are you?"

"I'm not really sure what happened myself," Nico told him, "and I'm not positive where I am."

"Are you being held prisoner?" Percy wanted to know.

_"I_ haven't really gotten a chance to talk with the people holding me," said Nico. Percy got the sense from Nico's tone that there was more to that statement than he could get from its surface value, but he could worry about that later.

"Who are they?" he asked.

"Those two kids. Sadie and Carter. I don't know their last names. They're the only two people that I've seen here. Unless you count their pet monkey. I think they let their monkey put a needle in my arm and hook me up to an IV, Percy." Nico sounded very disturbed.

Percy found that it was a bit easier to think now that he knew that Nico was alive, relatively well, and didn't seem to be in any immediate danger. "Do you know anything about where you are that will help me find you?"

"I can see the Statue of Liberty and the harbor in front of it from my window," Nico told him. "There's a balcony, but I can't go out on it. The door is sealed and I couldn't throw a chair through it. I'm pretty high up. The door of my room is locked too, and I'm not strong enough to shadow travel. I can't get out of here on my own . . ."

His eyes were intense and a little desperate and there was an almost pleading note in his voice, yet Percy was amazed that Nico still seemed unable to ask for help, even at a time like this.

"I'll come find you," Percy told him. "I've got Blackjack on standby."

"The glass though . . . it's either magic proof or bulletproof. Maybe both. I couldn't break it. Not with a chair or my sword."

"Then I'll just have to find another way in," said Percy. "Do those kids know who they're messing with?"

Nico bowed his head slightly. "They know who I am," he muttered.

"You mean they know your name?"

"They know who my dad is."

Percy frowned. "So they do know what they're messing with."

"I don't know." Nico closed his eyes and shook his head as though he was trying to rattle his thoughts back into place. "I was unconscious for four days, after that night in the park, Percy. When I woke up the first time it was only for a few minutes, and I only had time to . . . well . . . I- they . . ."

"It's okay, Nico," interrupted Percy. "Take your time. Breathe."

"When I woke up the first time . . . I was awake long enough to learn that . . . to learn that they know who I am and who my father is, but I don't think they know the full extent of that."

"Do you know how they found out?" Percy wanted to know.

Nico's face darkened with shame. "I . . . I told them."

_Talking in his sleep,_ Percy thought. _Or under the influence of drugs maybe?_ He could tell from Nico's face that he hadn't given up the information willingly. He just hoped for Carter and Sadie's sake that they hadn't tortured it out of Nico. If they had then there would be Hades for them to pay. And that would come after Percy was finished with them.

"It's not your fault," Percy told him quickly. "Don't fret over it, Nico."

Nico didn't look like he felt absolved of guilt by Percy's words. If anything he looked even more troubled. "I passed out again shortly after I woke up. I don't know how much time has passed since then."

"Not more than a few hours," Percy assured him. "Right now you've been missing for four days. This is the evening of the fourth day, I mean. I've been trying to find you ever since, but I had no idea where to look. I took Paul's car and went to Central Park that night. I got there too late to save you. You were already gone, as were the two House of Life freaks and the two kidnappers in training. I've been looking for you ever since. My mom's worried too. She's not complaining that I've been missing school to fly around looking for you."

"Miss Sally's worried?"

"She is," Percy told him, watching as Nico looked at him in disbelief. "I had to promise her I'd bring you by when I found you so she can see with her own eyes that you're still in one piece." He tried to smile, hoping to lighten the conversation up a little. "You better be careful. Tuesday is meatloaf night, and she puts peas and pearl onions in it."

Nico didn't look as horrified at that as he usually would have. He seemed to slouch a bit and looked like he was running out of energy fast.

"Nico? Hey, look at me!"

"Huh?" Nico blinked. "Sorry. I'm tired."

"Stay awake, just a few more minutes," Percy told him.

"We only had five minutes," muttered Nico.

"What?"

"I only had one drachma. There were more in my jacket, but . . . they took it. They didn't even wait until I was completely dead to go through my pockets looking for change." Nico looked very put out by this.

Five minutes. How long had they been talking already?

"Nico," said Percy urgently. "Can you tell me anything else that will help me find where you are?"

"Huh? Oh. Statue of Liberty. And the harbor. House is right on a river bank." Nico's eyelids fluttered like camera shutters. "I . . . hate . . . white curtains. White curtains cover the balcony sliding door. It's glass. I can't open it."

_A tall house on a river, probably the East River. _Percy pieced together everything Nico said in his mind. Nico's room had a balcony, sliding door, and white curtains. "Good, Nico. Anything else?"

"There's a monkey in the house. A really. Freaking. Ugly monkey."

"Okay, there's a monkey. Anything else about the house?"

"The door to my room is locked. I don't know what's beyond it."

"That's okay. Can you tell me anything else that you can see from your window?"

"I don't know anything else." Nico could barely keep his eyes open. "Don't know the buildings. Don't come to NYC much. The light is on in my room. Had to turn it on to send this message. Had to trick out a crystal ashtray to send this message. They left health food in the refrigerator but put an ashtray in the room. That's hypocritical. It doesn't make any sense."

It wasn't the only thing that didn't make any sense, but Percy couldn't really blame Nico right now.

"All right, so your light is on. That's good," Percy told him. "Keep it on, okay? It will help me find you."

"Okay." Nico gave a very sleepy smile. "I'll try . . . try to leave you another sign too."

"What sort of sign?"

"A skull maybe?"

"Um . . . I think I'll be okay without that," Percy told him, not sure what Nico had in mind and not sure that he wanted to know. "You just get near the window so I can see you, and wait for me, okay?"

"'Kay."

"Alright. I'm coming for you now."

"Wait!" Nico's eyes shot open again and he looked alarmed.

"What? Are you alright?"

"They took my jacket."

Percy frowned at his cousin.

"Most of my money was in there. And my sword, but that came back to me. But not my jacket. They've still got it."

"Forget the jacket," Percy told him.

"No, no, no. I need a jacket," Nico said urgently. "Any jacket."

Several dark images came into Percy's mind at Nico's insistence that he have a jacket. Cuts on his arms, scars on his wrists, and needle tracks were at the forefront of them, and he decided that he'd have to take a look at Nico's arms when he rescued the kid. "I'll bring you one of mine then, okay? Will that work?"

Nico nodded. He looked down, as though trying to see the logo on his shirt. "As long as it zips up. Or buttons."

"Alright then. I'm on my way now."

"You're really coming?"

"Of course I'm coming. Get to the window and wait for me. I'll be there before you know it."

* * *

AN: Sorry if Nico's acting a little out of character near the end. My reasoning for having him act like that was b/c in my limited experience I've noticed people who are exhausted tend to A) get mad and irritable at everyone and everything, B) start to think that everything's funny, regardless of whether or not it really is, or C) start acting dim and drowsy or childlike. And I personally think that at the end of The Last Olympian, Nico's on his way to seeing what Percy told him near the end of Battle of the Labyrinth is true; that it's okay to be a kid now and then. That's why I have him taking up Mythomagic again.

One last note, for those who don't play trading card games. Nico called Anubis an "intro pack reject" as an insult. For many trading card games you can buy intro packs, or decks that are all identical, in which the cards have been picked out by the card game's creators, with strategy and balance in mind. These cards usually range from really crappy to decent, with maybe one or two good ones thrown in. The really good cards you usually get in booster packs, which have a random assortment of cards in them, and the better they are, the rarer they are. So, many people get into a card game by buying an intro pack, then as they get more into the game, replace the weaker cards with better ones from booster packs. So, in short, by calling Anubis an intro pack reject, Nico was telling him that he and his card both really suck.

Maybe it's not such a great insult if I have to explain it, but I got the idea for this story when a picture popped into my mind of Nico and Anubis locked in an intense game of Mythomagic, perched on top of a sarcophagus-style coffin in a really old graveyard, so I had to throw that in there, lol. They're both quite similar. Both the neglected sons of really powerful and nasty gods that no one likes. Both always wearing black, and with powers linked to death. And they both seem to spend a lot of time hanging out in graveyards, so I could see them meeting and becoming Mythomagic buddies. Or rivals, lol. Anyway, please let me know what you think!


	4. Chapter 4

4

Hakim was not having a good week. It had been his bad luck to get stuck with the Kane assignment. Those snotty kids were proving to be more slippery than eels to catch, and this was even after they'd forsaken the powers of Horus and Isis. At times Hakim wished they hadn't. Then he wouldn't be on this crappy detail. He was good, but he wasn't a good enough magician to go up against one of the five great gods. Someone more powerful and important would be charged with tracking down those brats.

Of course that wasn't the only thing that was going wrong for him. No. Things were much, much worse, thanks to his stupid partner Aziza running off her mouth about every little detail of the "godling" that she'd dispatched. Word of that had gotten to the higher ups, who had realized from the details in her description that Aziza's "godling" was actually a demigod. By killing that stupid anemic kid, they'd breached an ancient unspoken treaty between the House of Life and the Greek pantheon, and now they were in trouble for it. It didn't matter that the kid had been smart-mouthed, and weak, with one foot in the grave already, and was probably the son of some god so minor that it didn't merit a mention in most school text books. The House of Life simply wanted to discipline someone just because of the principle of it, the hypocrites. There wasn't a magician in the entire house who actually liked those half-blood bastards. Everyone thought the world would be better off without them and their self-important parents. So why was Hakim getting extra shifts and a pay dock as punishment for being around when his partner got rid of one of them?

"That could have gone much worse," said Aziza as she and Hakim exited their audience with Desjardins.

"It wouldn't have gone on at all if you hadn't bragged about killing that demigod," griped Hakim.

"I thought it was a godling," Aziza shot back. "And you did too. If you'd been the one to kill it, you would have been bragging about it too, I guarantee."

She was right, of course, but Hakim had to deny it just out of principle. "I know when to hold my tongue."

"That demigod would be holding your corpse right now if I hadn't killed him for you," Aziza reminded him. "He's still holding your familiar, I believe? You haven't been able to summon Mutef since the incident, have you?"

"I can only summon him once every few days."

"So that's a no," sniffed Aziza. "Even dead, the demigod still defeats you."

"Silence, woman," growled Hakim.

At that moment the ground started to shake. Softly, at first, a rumbling like machinery, or a minor earthquake, but then the shaking grew until the ground split open and the screaming started as three hideous winged creatures flew out amidst plumes of smoke and hell-fire.

"What in the world?" asked Hakim, staring stupidly at the beasts, because he couldn't really get his mind around the idea that the first nome was being attacked.

There was complete and utter pandemonium as the three creatures flitted about, causing havoc, overturning carts in the open air market, setting stalls and kiosks afire, clawing any upturned face they came close enough to, and screaming in a language that Hakim did not understand.

Some of the magicians tried to rally to fight against the things, but they were ill-fated from the start. The bird monsters were swift and in constant motion, while the magicians were bound to the earth and their actions were muddled and hampered by all the people around them. They dodged every fireball and every other spell thrown at them, and laughed at the mortals and their cackles sounded like fingernails on a chalkboard.

"Hear me, foolish magicians!" shouted one of the creatures, still circling high overhead to avoid getting hit. "Weak-blooded scum of long conquored pharaohs that you are! In your stupidity you have roused Lord Hades' anger and now he gives you but one chance to save your miserable organization from utter ruin!"

"One amongst your number has abducted a son of the House of Hades!" crowed another one of the furies, and furies were what they had to be, since there were three of them and they were acting as messengers from the god Hades. "Lord Hades demands that his son be returned with in three days, and demands the heads of the culprits as tribute! If you do not heed his wishes then we will consider this act of kidnapping a declaration of war, and the House of Life and all its outposts will be razed to the ground!"

"Consider this a taste of things to come if you do not return the son of Hades!" shrieked the last fury, then as one all three of them dived back into the fissures in the ground.

Hakim had just breathed a sigh of relief, foolishly believing that the spectacle was over, when suddenly more high pitched screams filled the air. There were corpses climbing out of the rifts in the ground, clawing their way out of the Greek underworld. They began attacking the civilians as soon as they made it to their rotting, putrid feet, and once again pandemonium was widespread.

There were only a few casualties. The magicians in the crowd got their act together fairly fast after the dreaded furies were gone and managed to hack apart or incinerate the walking corpses. After that Hakim and Aziza were hustled back to Desjardin for another friendly chat. And throughout the whole ordeal a gold spotted cat with an amulet on its collar watched from the relative safety of the rooftops with great interest.

* * *

Percy wasted no time after finishing the Iris message with Nico. He didn't bother changing into armor since he didn't really need it. He just pulled on some clothes, grabbed a canteen of nectar, his bag of emergency ambrosia, and an extra jacket since it seemed to mean so much to Nico, ran outside, and ran to the pegasus stables where Blackjack was lounging.

_Yo, boss! Got something?_

"A lead on Nico," Percy told him. "You can carry both of us, right?"

Percy knew that Blackjack wasn't crazy about the way Nico smelled, but to its credit, the pegasus didn't balk.

_Sure thing, boss. That kid's so skinny a foal could carry him. Both of you will be no problem for me._

They flew at Blackjack's top speed, which was pretty darn fast.

"We're looking for a big building off the East River," Percy told him. "A room with the lights on that's facing the harbor. There will be a sliding glass door with white curtains that might or might not be pulled."

_And all we have to do is pick him up?_

"Well, I might have to break in and beat down a couple of magicians if we can't get the door open. If that happens I'll need you standing by ready for a quick getaway."

_Fast getaways happen to be my specialty. You and the corpse kid have got nothin' to worry about._

"I know you don't like how he smells," Percy said, patting the side of Blackjack's neck, "But I need you to try your hardest to get past that tonight. I'm not sure what kind of shape he's in." The memory of Nico's hazy expression was still fresh in his mind. "I'm not sure if he'll even be conscious. If I get him on your back and tell you to go, then I need you to go, and fly as steadily as you can. He might not be able to hold on."

_You got it boss. Your friends are my friends, even if they smell like the corpse kid does. I'll get him out of there and somewhere safe, then come back for you._

"No. I'll get out of there myself. All I'll have to do is make it to the river, then I'm home free." Percy chewed on his lip as he tried to figure out the best rendezvous point. "If we have to separate then fly Nico to Liberty Island and wait on the shore. I'll catch up to you there."

_Alright, boss. I can do that._

"I know you can. You're the best." Percy patted Blackjack's neck affectionately one more time.

_So we're looking for a five story building with a sliding glass window facing the Statue of Liberty?_

"Yep."

_With the lights on and white curtains?_

"Exactly."

_What about with a skull drawn on the window?_

"What? Where?"

_Right there._

Percy tried to see what Blackjack was talking about but couldn't. "Where?"

_The building we're in front of right now, boss._

"All I see is a rundown old warehouse."

_Look closer. Through the Mist._

Percy squinted, willing himself to see what was really there instead of what might be illusion. And then he saw it. On top of the warehouse was a five story mansion. One of the windows facing the river was lit up, and a skull had been painted onto the glass with some dark liquid.

Percy could see through the glass clearly since it was backlit. The room beyond it was very bright, with white walls. He could see a small figure in black sitting right next to the sliding door, leaning against the glass. Nico.

Then he saw something else. There were other people in the room, he realized. It was Sadie and Carter. Then there was something else. A humanoid figure that wasn't actually human. It had gold fur and wore a purple basketball jersey, and was hopping around like a rabid chimpanzee. It wasn't a chimpanzee though, but some other kind of primate. Percy didn't know what kind; he'd never paid much attention in school to what kind of monkey was which. It didn't matter much at that moment anyway, because Percy saw something else that caught his attention.

There was a sword in Sadie's hand. A three foot long black sword made of Stygian Iron. Nico's sword, Percy recognized. She stood over Nico and was saying something to him, looking cross. As Percy watched, his parallel cousin looked up at Sadie weakly and said something in response to her interrogations. Sadie's face twisted up making her look quite unattractive, and she kicked Nico, even though he was on the ground.

_She's going to kill him, _thought Percy with horror. "Blackjack, we need to get in that room right now! Batter down the glass!"

_Alright, boss! Hold on tight!_

Blackjack rose up into the air and then dropped like a stone, shooting toward the glass window in an almost vertical dive. At the very last second, before he crashed headfirst into the pane, he pulled up and struck with all four hooves. The glass shattered and Percy and Blackjack barreled in.

* * *

Carter and Sadie had been getting ready to go to bed when Khufu started going ape. He cocked his head and then jumped up from the basketball game that he was watching and started hooting.

The siblings traded glances then looked back at the baboon.

"What's wrong, Khufu?" Carter asked.

"Agh!" Khufu shouted at him. "Ugga!" Then he took off running up the stairs, hooting all the way.

Sadie and Carter followed, and somehow Carter was not surprised when the baboon came to a stop in front of the door of the guest room that they had given to Nico di Angelo and/or Anubis, depending on who was in control at the time.

Sadie immediately took out her key and was about to unlock the door, but Carter stopped her. He knocked, since it was polite.

"Nico?" he called out. "Are you awake?"

"Or Anubis?" added Sadie. "If you're the one whose awake right now." She sounded hopeful.

There was no answer. Khufu pounded on the door.

"Nico," Carter tried again. "We're starting to think something's wrong. Can you answer us?" He waited, but there was only silence. "If you don't answer then we're going to have to come in and check on you."

Again they waited, but received no response.

"I'm going in," announced Sadie, and this time Carter didn't stop her from inserting her key into the lock. She unlocked the door then turned the knob. Though the knob turned, the door did not open when she pushed against it. She looked at Carter confused then tried again.

Carter tried when she had no luck. Then they tried combining their strength but still the door did not open, not even when Khufu joined in the pushing with them.

"Nico!" Carter shouted. "Open the door!"

"Anubis!" called Sadie. "Hey Anubis, can you wake up and take control for a few minutes? Nico's somehow locked us out!"

They waited, but again got no response.

"What now?" asked Carter.

Sadie whipped out her staff. "What do you think?"

Carter sighed and stepped back as his sister pointed her staff at the door. "Ha-di!" she shouted, and hieroglyphics glowed in the air. The door split into pieces and the chair that Nico must have jammed under the knob fell to the ground with a clatter. Sadie strode inside confidently, her staff held in front of her, ready to blast the demigod if he caused any more problems. "You've been a bad, bad boy, Nico di Angelo," she sang out. "What are you up to, huh?"

The light was on. Directly under it was a crystal ashtray that Carter had seen on the counter when he'd stocked the fridge with healthy food for Nico. He'd left it alone because he hadn't thought Nico would be able to do anything dangerous with it. Now it was sitting on the floor and it was filled with water, and somehow Carter got the feeling that leaving it in there had been a mistake.

The bed was empty, but they didn't have to look far for their errant demigod. He was curled up in a ball, right beside the sliding glass door. On the floor beside him was a three foot long, wicked looking black sword that he definitely hadn't had on him when Carter and Sadie locked him in his room. Carter noticed that there were strips of white fabric wrapped around one of Nico's hands. They looked suspiciously like the towels that they'd left in the bathroom. And on the window was a picture painted in some opaque black liquid. A skull, Carter could tell from the shape. Crude and hastily done, but still recognizable.

"Nico?" asked Carter. "Hey, Nico?"

Sadie hurried over and got the sword before Nico could stir and get it himself. She picked it up by the hilt then stepped back and nudged the sleeping boy with her toe. "Hey, Death Boy. Wake up."

"Mmmm," Nico moaned and curled in on himself tighter. _"Sono stanco."_

"What? Speak English." Sadie nudged him again.

Big black eyes opened and looked up with sleepy confusion. "Percy?" he asked, then his eyes focused on Sadie and he groaned.

"Nope. Not Percy. Even better. It's me, Sadie!" Sadie flung her arms wide like a broadway actress in the middle of a number, despite the fact that she still had Nico's sword I her hand.

Nico's eyes narrowed into a glare as he realized his weapon had been confiscated. "That's mine," he growled, staring at the sword.

"Sorry, Death Boy, but until we're sure you won't try to slit our throats, you're not allowed to hold onto any sharp objects," Sadie told him.

A smile curled on Nico's lips. Combined with his corpse pale skin and the dark circles under his eyes, he looked like the poster child for creepy horror movie kids. "Try holding onto it," he told her. "Just try."

"Believe me, I'll do more than try."

"Nico," said Carter, "why was the door locked? What were you doing?"

"Plotting my escape."

"Your escape involves window art?" asked Sadie derisively.

Nico pushed himself up off the ground and sat up, leaning against the window for support. "I want to leave here now," he told them. "This is your only chance to let me go."

"Oh yeah?" said Sadie. "And what happens if we say no?"

"Bad things," Nico told them.

"Nico," said Carter, trying to be reasonable, "we're not holding your prisoner here, but you're not well enough to leave yet. I mean, can you even stand up?"

"I got from my bed to here."

"By crawling?" asked Carter.

"I walked. Around the room some too. And I got a bath."

"In your clothes," sneered Sadie.

"They were bloody."

"So you took a bath in them then went to sleep with them still on and still soaked. Bloody brilliant. Are you trying to catch pneumonia and die?"

Nico gave Sadie a look that said he thought she was stupid and annoying. Then he closed his eyes and rested the side of his face against the glass, like a kid on a school bus, preparing to fall asleep.

"What is that ugly thing you drew supposed to be, anyway?" asked Sadie.

"Your portrait."

"Sadie, don't –" Carter tried to say, but Sadie was already moving, and wouldn't have been likely to listen to him anyway. She kicked Nico in the ribs, harder than she needed to. Nico exhaled sharply in pain and curled away from her. "Stop it, Sadie! He's injured and he doesn't deserve that."

Sadie made an angry motion with the hand that held the sword. Not really a threatening motion, just one of her normal angry hand waves, as though she'd forgotten she still had the sword. "He called me ugly!"

"You called yourself ugly," said Carter to draw his sister's anger toward him so that she'd stop kicking their invalid guest.

"Why you –"

Suddenly the window shattered. There was no warning or anything. Just a loud noise like cracking ice, and suddenly shards of glass were flying everywhere. A large dark shape barreled into the room so fast that Carter could barely make sense of it.

_A horse, _he thought feeling stupid and slow. _With wings._

Sadie had squealed and scrambled backward when the window went. Her staff was in her hand again, which was a good move. Carter reached into the Duat and extracted his own sword, but even before he'd managed to do that, Sadie had been disarmed. A patch of shadow had detached itself from the winged horse's back and disarmed Sadie with a glowing bronze sword.

"Don't do anything stupid, magicians!" shouted the teenager who now had his sword point to Sadie's throat. "I don't want anyone to be hurt tonight, but if you insist on trying to fight us, you'll be the ones who die."

Carter froze. He didn't like the sight of a sword-blade at his sister's throat.

"Drop the sword," ordered the older teen. Carter immediately obeyed and let his khopesh fall to the hardwood floor.

"Percy?" Nico asked, looking up dazed.

"Nico," said Percy, sparing a glance at the younger boy. "Are you okay?"

"Percy?" asked Nico again.

"Yeah, it's me."

"Percy, my blood is black."

It was true, Carter saw. There were a few superficial cuts on Nico's face from the glass. Black droplets slowly made their way down his corpse pale skin. And the makeshift bandage of cut up towels on his hand was stained black too, now that Carter looked at it closely.

The look on Percy's face made it clear that he wasn't extremely pleased about this. "Is that normal for you, Nico? For people of your lineage, I mean?"

"Don't know."

"How long has it been like that?"

"Don't know."

Percy did not look happy. "Get on Blackjack, Nico. Okay?"

"But he doesn't like me."

"He likes you fine," Percy assured his friend. "My friends are his friends. He wants to rescue you just as much as I do."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Wait," said Carter as Nico tottered to his feet. "Percy, is it?"

"It is," Percy told him coldly. "And you idiots are Carter and Sadie."

"Who are you calling an idiot?" demanded Sadie.

"Sadie shut up," Carter told her. To Percy he said, "Look man . . . we don't have to be enemies."

"You kidnapped my cousin," said Percy darkly.

"Cousin?" asked Sadie.

"Yes. My cousin," snapped Percy. "He tried to help you and your boyfriend and you repay him by holding him against his will."

"Carter is not my boyfriend you bloody fool! He's my brother!"

Carter focused on the more important issue. "We didn't kidnap him, Percy. He got in the middle of a fight we were having with a couple of our real enemies. He got drug into it by . . . odd circumstances. They attacked him. The three of us were on the same side. He passed out during the fight and we brought him home with us."

"And locked him up."

"In case you haven't noticed," Carter decided to point out, "he's kind of dangerous."

"Not to his allies, he's not. If you were really on the same side as him, you wouldn't have anything to worry about," said Percy.

"We didn't know how dangerous or stable he was," Carter tried to reason. "So we locked the door to his room since we were going to sleep."

"If you're really not our enemies, as you claim, then you won't stop us trying to leave," said Percy.

"We're not going to try to stop you," said Carter quickly. "If you're his cousin and Nico trusts you, we have no problem with him going home with you. Like I said, we're not your enemies."

"That's very good for you."

"Percy?"

"What Nico?"

"The horsie's too tall. I can't get on it."

Percy, too his credit, didn't get mad at Nico even though the situation was undoubtedly a very stressful one for him, and the childlike state of Nico's drowsy mind obviously wasn't helping anything. "Okay. Hang on a second," he said to his cousin, then glared at Sadie and Carter. "Put your hands on your heads," he told them. They obeyed. "Now back up, slowly. Keep backing up. Okay, stop. Now Nico and I are leaving. If you try anything stupid, I swear on the River Styx, I will make you regret it."

"We won't do anything stupid," Carter told him. "We won't try to stop you. But –"

"But?" There was pure danger in Percy's glare.

"Some of the things Nico saw . . . and some of the . . . problems he might be having now –"

"Your problems aren't his," said Percy sharply.

"No. He's got some problems of his own now, because of what happened the other night. He knows what I'm talking about too. Don't you, Nico?"

Nico looked panicked for a moment then shook his head violently. Then stumbled and fell. "I don't . . . I don't . . ."

"Enough," said Percy angrily. "We're leaving."

"Nico might need to talk to us again," said Carter quickly. "If you do . . . if he does . . ."

"Then we know where to find you." Percy stepped back and closer to his cousin. He stabbed his sword into the floor, pulled Nico off the ground, then put his hands together, making a step for him. "Come on. I'll give you a boost."

Nico accepted the help and managed to climb onto the pegasus' back. "My boots are gone," he said dimly. He wiggled his bare toes. "My socks too."

"I'll get you another pair," said Percy in a strained voice. He pulled his sword out of the floor then vaulted onto the black winged horse's back, behind Nico. Probably didn't trust the younger boy to hold on and figured it was safer to hold his cousin in front of him. "Come on, Blackjack. Time to go."

At its master's words, the black pegasus galloped back out the window and took to the air, disappearing into the dark night.

"Well," said Sadie, watching as their guests disappeared into the night sky, "that went well."

"Shut up, Sadie," said Carter wearily. He picked up his sword and pointed it at the window. "Hi-nehm." The glass shards flew off the floor and fitted themselves back into place in the window pane like a jigsaw puzzle. Within moments the sliding glass door was whole again, complete with the creepy black blood skull.

"Don't act like I'm responsible for what just happened there. I didn't ask that crazy Pegasus Kid to come riding in like one of your stupid cowboys."

"I'm willing to bet quite a bit that he came charging in like the Lone Ranger because he saw you waving that sword around and kicking his cousin. Speaking of which, where is the sword?" Carter looked around for it but it was nowhere to be found.

"They must have taken it with them," said Sadie with a shrug. "And I wasn't hurting the stupid Yank."

"Kicking someone when they're on the ground looks back from any standpoint," Carter told her. "And you looked pretty darn scary waving that sword around. If I didn't know you, I probably would have thought you were going to hurt him. Percy had every reason to assume you were going to kill his cousin, so he did what he thought he had to. What either of us would have done if we'd been in his shoes."

Sadie huffed like she couldn't believe Carter had the nerve to look at the situation objectively.

"Now we've got a Greek demigod possessed by an Egyptian death god, and a sword wielding pegasus rider, who is probably a demigod himself, who might decide to be our enemies now. Like we didn't have enough of them before."

"Oh shut up," said Sadie angrily.

"When Bast and Amos get back they are not going to be happy," said Carter. He spotted part of a cut up towel on the floor and picked it up intending to wipe Nico's window art away.

"Agh!" grunted Khufu, appearing out of nowhere and jumping in front of him before he could reach the window. "Ugh gah!"

"What is it, Khufu?"

"Guh agha!" Khufu pointed frantically at the skull of black blood and allowed Carter to step closer cautiously.

"I don't believe this," Carter muttered when he saw what Khufu was going on about.

"What?"

"Nico's blood . . . it's eating away at the glass."

"Huh?"

"His blood is dissolving the freaking glass!" said Carter in disbelief. "How is that even possible? There's a reason that glass is used for storing all kinds of chemicals and acids, and that reason is because it's so resistive to corrosive liquids! And now some anemic kid's blood is dissolving it like papyrus in water!"

"The blood of a death god's son," mused Sadie. "Or the blood of a death god's host. I wonder which is what made it turn black and icky?"

"Black and icky . . ." Carter gave Sadie a weary look.

"Well, it is black and icky."

Carter shook his head and sighed. "I don't know what to do about it. Khufu obviously doesn't want us to touch it, even with a towel, but I kind of don't want to just leave it there. What if it messes up the mansion's magic protections?"

"What if it already has?" Sadie asked. "Pegasus Kid shouldn't have been able to ride in here like he was bloody Chuck Norris on a winged stallion. Who's to say Death Boy's blood didn't dissolve our magic protections along with the glass. It would make sense why Khufu started going ape."

Carter tossed the towel aside. "We can research how to put magic protections back up tomorrow," he said. "Hopefully the only place that's affected is this window."

* * *

Percy intended to take Nico directly back to Camp Half-Blood, but he quickly came to the conclusion that that might not be the best idea.

For one thing, Nico was soaking wet. Spring wasn't a long way off, but it was still far enough, especially in New York, and flying above the city, it was freaking cold. He wasn't sure what the son of a death god's physiology was like, or whether or not Nico could or would get sick, but after four days and nights of worrying about the kid, he really didn't feel like taking any chances.

"Blackjack," he said to his pegasus, "head to my mom's place."

_Right on, boss._

Nico slouched against Percy's chest, most likely unconscious if the way his head was lolling was any clue. Percy felt him start to shiver and heard his teeth start to chatter, and decided that he had indeed made the right decision to get Nico indoors again as quickly as possible. And he doubted that he had to worry about any pursuit, even though he was keeping a constant eye out for any signs of it. Carter at least hadn't seemed like a bad guy. Sadie hadn't seemed too bad either, just impetuous and unwilling to admit when she was being stupid or wrong. Percy now had his doubts as to whether or not she had really been planning on killing Nico. Not that he regretted his actions. From his point of view, she'd certainly looked like she was going to kill him, and he couldn't have left something like that up to chance.

Within only minutes Blackjack was landing on the fire escape of Percy's apartment. Percy slid off the pegasus' side and pulled Nico down as well.

"Thanks, Blackjack. You're awesome."

_We're awesome boss. We make an awesome team. You just whistle when you need a ride back to camp, and I'll come flyin'._

Percy nodded his thanks and set Nico down with his back against the wall while he opened the window to his room. Then he carried Nico inside and lay the younger boy down on his bed.

Nico moaned fitfully and curled into a ball, still shivering. Percy turned on the light and waited for his cousin to open his eyes, but Nico remained asleep.

"Hey Nico?" he said, feeling a bit bad, but he felt that this was necessary. "Wake up for a minute, will you? You need to change out of those clothes."

"Mmm," Nico moaned when Percy shook him by the shoulder.

"Nico, you're going to get pneumonia if you don't put on something dry." But Nico remained out cold.

Percy sighed and went to his closet. He pulled out a dark green sweatshirt and dug his darkest pair of jeans out from one of his clothes drawers, and a pair of thick wool socks from another then returned to Nico's side. "Last chance to wake up and change yourself, Nico," he tried. "I'm sorry, but I can't let you keep wearing those."

"Plus five hundred special attack on elementals," muttered Nico, obviously not aware of what Percy was saying at all.

With another sigh, Percy unbuttoned his cousin's jeans, pulled them off, and replaced them with a dry pair, which were definitely way too big, but better than a pair that fit but was frozen with frost. Then he grabbed the hem of Nico's shirt and pulled the garment over his head and carefully worked his cousin's arms out of the sleeves.

Then he froze as the object in the center of Nico's chest caught his eye. "What the . . ."

His reaction to seeing the black stone scarab that was imbedded in Nico's chest as much better than Nico's own reaction. Though if he had discovered it in his own chest, Percy would likely have freaked out too. He touched the carved stone tentatively, searching for edges that he could get his fingers under to peel it away, but found none. Its warmth disturbed him, as did the black blood vessels that spiraled out around it, and the fact that it seemed to have its own heart beat. Experimentally, he put two of his own fingers over Nico's wrist and his other hand on the scarab. Sure enough, the scarab's heartbeat was in sync with Nico's own.

That's why he wanted the jacket, Percy realized, but he checked the insides of Nico's arms just to be sure. There were no cut scars or old needle marks. Well there was one needle mark, but it was recent and Percy remembered Nico saying something about a monkey hooking him up to an IV. Nico hadn't wanted long sleeves to cover his arms though. He'd wanted something bulky to cover the bulge under his T-shirt. He'd planned on hiding the . . . whatever it was. Percy couldn't exactly blame him, but was a bit stung to realize that Nico probably hadn't intended to tell him about it.

Nico's teeth started chattering again and Percy quickly came back to his senses. He pulled the sweatshirt over Nico's head and got his arms through the sleeves. Then he put the socks on his cousin's feet and pulled down the covers on the other half of the bed. He moved Nico beneath them and covered him. Nico kept shivering, so Percy got an extra blanket out of his closet and draped that over him as well. He waited a moment to see if his cousin's teeth would stop chattering, and was about to go get the blanket off of the sofa and add that onto the stack when Nico finally stopped shivering.

"That's something at least," muttered Percy as he closed the window and flipped off the light. He would have to fill Paul and his mother in on what was going on, and tomorrow he and Nico needed to have a talk about a lot of things. Like what was up with those two magicians, and whether or not the House of Life needed to be given a warning to leave demigods alone, or else. And above all, what was that winged scarab stuck to his chest for. But all those things could wait until tomorrow.

Percy looked forward to his first decent night's sleep in four days, now that he knew his friend was alive and safe. For the moment, at least.

* * *

Next chapter: Percy gets filled in on the situation and Nico tries to bribe Anubis to leave him alone!

I've been spending most of my time during study hall thinking about what I want to do with this story, where I want it to go. (Exams are next week, but I've been studying for them all semester, and if I don't know it by now I'm not going to learn it so I might as well use my time more constructively) Once I start something, I almost always stick with it until the end, but I'm famous for not looking before I leap. My mom is worried that I'll break my neck diving off a cliff because I didn't check to see how deep the water was, but that's ridiculous, because the only thing I hate worse than heights is jumping from them. I'm more likely to scrape my face against the bottom of a riverbed doing a surface dive without checking the depth, not that that's likely either because I'm not a complete idiot. But the point I'm trying to get at is that I didn't really have much of a plan when I started this story, and had never written anything this long before, but now I have more of a plan. Of course, plans can change, especially when I'm in charge of them, so I'll wait a few more chapters before sharing some of my spoiler-free ideas to see what other people think. But for now, please rest assured that I know how this particular story is going to end and made a list of what I think are key plot points that will get me to the end, so it won't end up as one of those tragically abandoned stories that everyone hates.

Please let me know what you think! Reviews are my reason for continuing to breathe!


	5. Chapter 5

5

The next time Nico awoke it was with a strange sense of contentment. He wasn't so deathly tired anymore. He felt stronger. And he felt warm for once. Very warm, in fact, and comfortable.

He grabbed two fistfuls of the covers and pulled them snugly around him then turned onto his side and buried his face in the pillow.

Then he realized that he had no idea where he was.

Both of his dark eyes snapped open and he took in his situation. Unlike the last time he awoke, the sights that greeted his eyes were less disturbing. He was in a small room with dark blue walls, instead of a cavernous room with oppressing white walls. And he was on a twin bed with a cloth pillow and a pile of different colored blankets draped over him, rather than a king sized bed that threatened to swallow him, with stupid white sheets and an even stupider headrest for dead Egyptians. There were some pictures on the wall. Posters of fish and a fantasy art print of a black pegasus.

It didn't take one of Athena's kids to figure out whose room he was in.

Nico sat up slowly, reluctant to leave the warmth of the bed. He felt a bit guilty as he realized that he'd stolen his cousin's bed from him the previous night, but that was quickly drowned out by panic as he realized that he wasn't wearing the same clothes that he'd had on last time he was conscious.

A dark green sweat shirt hung off his thin frame, the sleeves covering his hands completely and dropping past them a good six inches. Nico's hand flew to his chest to touch his heart scarab through the shirt. Then he tugged at the neck of the sweatshirt, hoping to find his black T shirt beneath it. No luck. Someone had changed his clothes while he slept. Probably Percy. And unless he had done it in the dark, then there was no way he could have missed the big stone scarab imbedded in Nico's chest.

Nico groaned and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He stood and tried to take a step, but ended up getting tangled in his oversized jeans and fell to the floor with a very loud thump.

_Great, _he thought miserably, _that's sure to bring someone running._

Sure enough, footsteps sounded in the hallway then the door opened. Percy peered in cautiously then his eyes went to Nico on the floor. He stepped inside his room and hurried over to his cousin. "Are you okay?"

Nico jerked his head in a nod then touched his heart scarab again. "You saw." He didn't phrase it as a question.

"The stone bug that's stuck to your chest? Yeah," confessed Percy, "I saw."

Nico looked at the rest of what he was wearing. A pair of jeans that must have been Percy's too and a pair of warm black socks. Not his usual all black wardrobe, but it wasn't bad, even if it was colorful. At least they were dark colors. And they were warm.

"What? Hey!" protested Nico as Percy picked him up off the floor and set him back down on the bed. "I'm not a kid."

"You are too a kid," Percy told him. "And dressed like that you're even more obviously one."

"Chronologically, I'm older than your mom you know," said Nico irritably. "Probably older than her mom too."

Percy rolled his eyes, and then started rolling up Nico's sleeves for him, as though he was all of three years old. "Mom's washing your other clothes for you, by the way. You'll have to endure wearing these until they've finished drying."

"At least they're not white," muttered Nico. He tolerated Percy's mother-hen behavior, since he knew he'd need the practice for when Sally Jackson finally got her hands on him.

"Are you really okay, Nico?" asked Percy after he'd finished rolling up Nico's sleeves. There was unfeigned concern in his eyes that made Nico feel uncomfortable and guilty. He hadn't meant to inconvenience Percy so much.

He meant to lie and try to assure his cousin that he was fine, but the words came out of his mouth before he could stop them. "I don't know."

The worry in Percy's expression went up another notch and he sat down beside Nico, still looking at him intently. "Does it hurt?" he asked. "The beetle thing, I mean."

"Sometimes," Nico said honestly.

"Were you planning on telling me about it if I hadn't seen it?"

"Probably not," confessed Nico. He bowed his head slightly. "Sorry."

"Are you going to tell me about it now?"

"Do I have a choice?"

"Nico." Percy just said his name once and waited until the younger boy looked up and met his gaze before speaking again. "You always have a choice. If you're really that dead set against telling me what happened then I'm not going to twist your arm into it. I just hope that you know that whatever trouble you're in, I'm here if you want my help. I hope you know that you can trust me."

"I do trust you," muttered Nico. He forced himself to keep looking at Percy while he spoke, though his eyes seemed to be demanding that he look away, at the walls or the ceiling, or out the window, or anywhere other than his cousin. "More than I trust anyone else. More than I've _ever_ been able to trust anyone else." He pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around the outside of his legs to hug them close, and hoped that his embarrassment at this touchy-feely comment wasn't showing on his face. "There has never been anyone who's ever tried to help me like you have. Even when I was horrible to you after . . . well you know."

"You were young and in pain and I'm not big on grudges," Percy told him.

Nico tore his gaze away from Percy and rested his chin on top of his knees. After Bianca had died he really had been horrible to Percy. Even when he'd known it wasn't really Percy's fault, he'd been so furious that he had to lash out at someone. He'd seen what happened in his nightmares; how Bianca had stupidly picked up the Hades figurine and tried to leave that junk heap place with it. How Percy came up with a plan to kill that giant Greek mecha-thing, a plan which Bianca had stolen and tried to put into action by herself. Nico didn't know which of those actions was more stupid. In hindsight he was realizing a lot of things about his older sister that he felt bad for thinking and would never have dreamed of speaking out loud.

She'd been shallow. Hypocritical. She tried to act like she was the grown up and tried to mimic what she thought their mother would have been like, and had been overly strict. Only letting him watch G rated movies, no candy or fast food, no swearing, or Magic: The Gathering cards because some of the images on those cards were too violent or scary. Nico had only rebelled once, and that had left his sister in tears, threatening to leave him alone in the world and never look back. He'd never gone against her or questioned her lame attempts at parenting after that, but she'd gone and abandoned him anyway. She'd joined Artemis' Hunters because she didn't want to be saddled with the responsibility of caring for Nico, then she'd gone and gotten herself killed doing something so freaking stupid that were she anyone else, Nico would have thought she _deserved_ a Darwin Award.

So why? Why was Percy always looking out for him? He didn't have to. No one told him to. Nico wasn't his responsibility or his little brother. They were family, but only in a convoluted, DNA-less way that rendered any real family or genetic ties null and void. He'd been nothing but horrible to Percy, telling him that he hated him, acting like the biggest brat in the world, stupidly getting himself into trouble and forcing Percy to save him twice, then accidentally betraying him in the Underworld. So why did Percy give a care what happened to him one way or the other? No one else did, and of everyone in the world, Percy had more reasons to hate him than anyone else? So why? It didn't make any sense!

_He was raised as an only child. It can get lonely._

Nico's head snapped up as Anubis spoke. _You!_

_Yes. It's me. I thought I'd check in and see how you and the Kane siblings were doing, but it seems you've been busy while I left you to your own devices._

"Gods, you're one annoying jackal-headed freak."

"What?" Percy sounded more than a little taken aback.

"Not you!" Nico said quickly. "I wasn't talking to you! I'm sorry."

_You should be nicer to your cousin. He seems to genuinely care about you, and he's not loud and obnoxious like my cousin Horus is. _

Nico held up his hand, making a motion to Percy to wait a second. "I need a minute. Sorry. I'll explain to you, just as soon as I . . . gods, there's no way to say this without sounding like a lunatic."

"Uh, okay. Take your time," said Percy generously.

_Will you leave so I don't have to carry on two conversations at once? _Nico asked._ Or were you planning on using me as your freaking marionette and having a heart to heart with my cousin like you did with big-headed Carter and ugly Sadie?_

_ Sadie's not ugly_, Anubis said immediately.

_Yeah she is. You just don't know any better because you're too used to seeing people with hippo heads or mummified faces. Or, of course, freaks who have a whole giant scarab in place of their head like that Capri fool from your pantheon._

_ Khepri,_ Anubis corrected him. _And speaking of the scarab, I have been doing some research into the matter._

"Really?" Nico perked up. "What did you find out?"

"What?"

"Not you. Sorry." Nico shook his head, trying to keep his thoughts straight.

"Are you okay, Nico?"

"Yeah. Just talking to the voice in my head. I'll explain to you in a minute." He switched back to projecting his thoughts at Anubis. _What did you find out?_

_ Nothing._

_ Nothing? Then why in Hades' name did you even bring it up?_

_ To let you know that I have been looking into the matter. As far as I know, nothing like this has ever happened before. Scarabs have always been used as symbols of good fortune and rebirth. You are probably aware that scarabs made of carved stone were placed over the hearts of the deceased during the mummification process –_

_ To keep the heart from being weighed down by its sins when you weighed it against your stupid feather,_ Nico cut in, _or to help the soul learn how to turn into a bird, which makes even less sense than trying to lighten a heart by weighing it down with a rock. _

_Its purpose when it was placed over the heart was symbolic,_ Anubis tried to explain, _not literal. And how did you learn all this? I thought you were dyslexic._

_ I am. I raised a dead librarian to read to me._

_ . . . and you say that I'm the freak?_

_ Last time I checked only one of us had a jackal head, and it wasn't me._

Anubis gave a mental sigh. _I also looked into the reasons that my past subjects began removing the heart and replacing it with a stone scarab, to try to figure out why the change came about. _

_ Let me guess, that didn't turn up anything either._

_ I'm still researching it. There are millions of souls to be questioned and sadly none of them have perfect recall. After being dead more than three thousand years details seem to slip their minds. So far the only thing I have been able to learn is that the embalming process was sometimes altered in hopes that replacing the heart with a scarab would transform the deceased's soul into a living personification of death. The spirits who mentioned this used ambiguous wording and weren't very forthcoming, but I will try to find out more._

_ If that's all you've got then would you mind getting out of my head for awhile? I want to talk with Percy now._

He felt rather than heard Anubis give his consent, and the god's consciousness began to withdraw from his own. But it didn't decrease to the level that Nico considered normal.

_You're still there, _he accused._ I can feel you._

_I thought it best to leave a bit more of my consciousness with you, so that I am not so out of the loop every time I check in on you._

_ No. I don't want you here spying on me all the time. I want to talk to my cousin without any interruptions._

_ And I will let you. Unless you speak to me directly I will not interfere, but I think it's important that I know._

Nico could feel that there wouldn't be any compromising on this point, but still, he had to try. _I'll bring you a Happy Meal if you get out of my head._

_ A Happy Meal?_

_ Alright, two Happy Meals!_

Anubis sent his confusion through their telepathic link. _Why would the meals be happy?_

Nico's brow furrowed. _Because they're Happy Meals! Don't you know what a Happy Meal is?_

_ ?_

_ . . . never mind. _There went Nico's best bargaining chip. He gave a mental sigh. _Alright, you can keep enough consciousness in my skull to know what's going on, but don't take me over again or I'll . . . I'll start singing at you. Everyone knows it's annoying when you get a song stuck in your head, but I imagine it's a lot worse to be stuck in someone else's head while they're trying to get a song to stick in your head._

Now that things were settled with the voice in his head, Nico turned to Percy. "Sorry," he said.

"Are you okay?"

Nico shrugged. "I seem to have quite a few problems right now. Last chance to back the heck out while you still can."

Percy shook his head, as Nico knew he would. "What kind of person would I be if I let you do this alone?"

"A normal person," said Nico honestly. "Which we both know you're not . . . and I'm glad. Because if anyone can help me with this . . ." He cringed at how sappy what he was saying sounded, but he needed to throw Percy a bone every now and then, let him know that he was appreciated. "If anyone is completely insane enough to want to help me with something this screwed up it would be you!"

"I'll consider myself counted in, then," decided Percy. "So why don't you tell me what's going on? And why don't you start with the voices in your head?"

"Not voices. One voice. Singular," explained Nico. "The Egyptian god of death somehow tangled his soul with mine, and can't separate them now, but can now possess me at will."

"Wha- what?" Percy stared at him. "Possess you?"

Nico nodded morosely.

"Egyptian god of death . . . that's Osiris, right? The guy with the green face who's wrapped up like a mummy?"

Nico shook his head. "Osiris is the god of the dead. Anubis is the god of death, the process, and also the god of the dying, and embalming. Apparently no one from the Egyptian pantheon was man enough to be the death god by himself, so they had to split it up. Unlike my dad, who is not going to be happy if he ever finds out about this." He could feel Anubis' annoyance at his judgment of the Egyptian gods' manliness, but the god kept his word and didn't offer any comments.

So Nico explained to Percy what had happened four days ago in the park, from his point of view. He skimped on the details about how badly the Ribbons of Hathor had hurt, and how he'd been sure that he was dying right then and there, but he could tell by his cousin's expression that Percy knew he was omitting how much danger he'd been in. Percy had seen what happened, of course, and judging from the shadows on his face, Nico was pretty sure he must have been a really sorry sight.

He continued on to the part about meeting Anubis in the Egyptian underworld, and how he shouldn't have been able to get in there at all since all demigod souls were the property of the Greek gods, then told Percy how he'd nearly incinerated whatever was left of his own soul trying to use his powers and how then something had happened when Anubis touched him. He explained about waking up in the Kanes' house, and about how he was pretty sure that they let their pet monkey put a needle in his arm and hook him up to an IV, and about how it continued to be one nightmare after another, as he found out that Anubis could completely take control of his body whenever he felt like it, and how he'd blacked out right after Anubis left.

By the time he got to the point where he woke up the second time, he was feeling exhausted all over again, as though he hadn't spent the last five days doing nothing but sleeping. But he managed to tell Percy about how he'd found the winged scarab on his chest when he went to wash off the dried blood and the sweat, and how he'd discovered that it wasn't just stuck over his heart, but had actually replaced his heart. He explained how Anubis was pretty freaking useless, not knowing anything about it, or even why his own subjects had decided to alter their funeral customs on occasion and replace some of their mummies' hearts with scarabs.

By the time he was finished, it was all Nico could do to keep his eyes open. He'd long since abandoned the attempt to stay upright and had flopped back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling while he spoke.

"Well," said Percy when Nico finally reached the point where Percy had charged in to rescue him, "this certainly is . . ."

"Screwed up," Nico supplied. "I'll give you one more chance to get out of this. You can pretend you never heard any of this if –"

"I'm involved," Percy cut him off. "You're my friend, and you're in trouble, so I'm here. And I've kind of gotten this whole saving the world thing down by now. So stop trying to get rid of me."

"I dun wanna get rid of you." Nico slurred his words a bit, he was so tired. "'m glad you're on my side. Just wanted to be fair to you."

"So is getting tired out so fast a side effect of hosting a god?" Percy asked. "It doesn't sound like you've been awake more than an hour and a half in the past four or five days."

"Might be," said Nico. "A side effect, I mean. This isn't even supposed to be possible. Egyptian gods can only take certain hosts. Certain bloodlines make better hosts than others, and they usually ended up becoming Egyptian royalty. Makes sense that the gods would decide to rule here on earth, I guess. But they never managed to possess a demigod, and alot of them tried. Back when the Roman Empire pwned Egypt and the House of Life started rounding up and banishing all their gods. Before, they'd stayed away from demigods because the two pantheons had a healthy fear and respect for each other and didn't mix, and they didn't want to piss off our gods by possessing their kids. When they got desperate, many of them tried to take demigod hosts at the risk of pissing off our parents, but it didn't work. Our powers aren't compatible. Or at least they're not supposed to be."

Nico stopped talking and frowned. "How do I know that? Anubis didn't tell me that. So how . . ."

_You have access to some of my memories when I leave this much of my consciousness with you, _Anubis told him_. _It sounded like he was talking from far, far away, and he also sounded a bit distracted, like he was attending to something else._ If you try to remember something that I remember, you'll be able to. Part of the time at least._

"Well that's just great," Nico told Percy. "Our mind meld gives me access to some of Anubis' memories. I guess this means I can see instant replays of all the corpses he's desecrated in the name of embalming."

Percy patted him on the shoulder. "Well, that's good news. What you remembered at least. If Anubis is right, then demigods can't be possessed by the Egyptian gods, with you as the only exception, then we have a little less to worry about."

"How so?" asked Nico. He somehow felt like he should be able to figure this out on his own, but it took too much effort at the moment.

"We don't have to worry about the Egyptian gods' war coming to us," explained Percy. "If we can't host them, then the Egyptian gods shouldn't be too concerned about us, and the House of Life should be busy enough trying to seal them away that they won't try to make an enemy out of us. If the demigods, or our parents decide to get involved in their war, it will be on our own terms at least. And if they think that demigods can't be possessed by the Egyptian gods, then they'll have no reason to suspect that you've got Anubis hanging out in your skull. If they think it's impossible for an Egyptian god to possess a demigod then they won't think that you and Hades are allying yourselves with the Egyptian gods for some sort of takeover."

"They might sense him in me if they come face to face with me," pointed out Nico. "The other gods might be able to feel his power in me. My dad will know for certain. He'll know that there's a foreign god's power inside of me, probably the moment he sees me."

"Can you avoid him for awhile?" Percy asked. "Long enough for us to figure out how to exorcise Anubis?"

Nico nodded. "I can try. It shouldn't be too hard actually, since he really doesn't care what I do. But if he finds out about this, he's not going to like it at all, Percy. I know that Zeus and Poseidon will think he'd jump at the chance to ally himself with an Egyptian death god and try to shift the balance of power, but he wouldn't do that. As much as he pretends otherwise, he likes things the way they are. He likes having his own kingdom, away from the other Olympians, because being around other people so much annoys him. He wouldn't try to change that by teaming up with foreign gods, and he would never allow anyone to trap me in my own skull and use my body as their puppet."

"I believe you," Percy told him. "But have you considered that maybe he could actually help you –"

"No!" said Nico frantically. "He can't know!"

"Nico–"

"I only just got him to see me as a real person! As someone worthy to be part of the House of Hades. I can't let him know how bad I just screwed up, getting myself possessed by a potential enemy and putting myself in a position to be used against him! That's what he'll see this as, Percy! He might even kill me himself. It will be the easiest way to get rid of the threat, and in his mind he'd be protecting me rather than hurting me."

"Alright, I get it," said Percy as soon as Nico stopped for breath. "We'll find a way to get Anubis out of your head without your dad's or any other god's help. Any idea where to start?"

Nico considered this for a moment. "With breakfast?" he suggested hopefully when nothing else came to mind.

Percy smiled at that. "Sounds like a plan."

* * *

Percy had to carry Nico to the breakfast table. His cousin protested this rather loudly, but wasn't strong enough to try to resist. Percy did give him the chance to try to walk on his own, but Nico hadn't been strong enough to. He fell down three times before Percy decided that was enough, and lifted him off the floor. And his falling down had nothing to do with his ill-fitting clothing. Percy had given Nico a belt to keep the jeans from falling down over his hips. They'd had to use Riptide to punch another hole in the leather of the belt so that it would cinch tight enough, and then they'd had to roll up the jeans' legs the same way Percy had done to Nico's sleeves, but even after all that, Nico hadn't been able to stay on his feet.

"Nico!" Percy's mother said brightly upon seeing the younger boy. "I'm so glad that you're finally awake."

"Miss Sally," Nico said, sounding shy as he always did when talking to Percy's mother. He shrunk away from her slightly, leaning back into Percy before his cousin set him down in a chair at the table. "Good morning."

Sally wasted no time filling plates for both boys, heaping fruit, poached eggs, and toast in front of them, to go along with the big bowls of oatmeal that were already waiting.

Nico was normally a picky eater, Percy had discovered, at least where healthy foods were concerned. He regarded anything that wasn't deep fried or smothered in transfat with great suspicion, and never, ever managed to finish an entire plate that Sally put before him, at least not until today. That morning he wolfed everything in front of him down like it was a race, and gave the second helpings that Sally put in front of him the same treatment. He even accepted a third helping of oatmeal, and finished the entire glass of mixed fruit juice that Sally had poured for him, which was a first.

"Hungry much?" asked Percy when it finally appeared that his cousin was finished.

Nico looked embarrassed. "I guess I was," he said sheepishly. "Thank you for breakfast, Miss Sally."

"You can just call me Sally," Percy's mother told the boy. "You don't have to bother with the Miss." She'd told him the exact same thing at least a dozen times before, so it was unlikely that Nico would change his ways today, Percy knew. "The dryer's broken, so it will be awhile before you can have your old clothes back," continued Sally, "You'll have to make do with Percy's things for now. They're a little big, I know, but you look nice wearing colors for once."

Nico looked down at his attire darkly, and Percy wondered what the kid was actually thinking. Nico had been very venomous when he talked about how many white things were in the room that he woke up in at the Kanes' mansion. He talked about the clothes that they left for him like they were a deliberate insult.

"These are warm," said Nico at last, plucking at the sleeve of his sweatshirt. That was probably the nicest thing he'd ever said about any piece of clothing that wasn't black.

"We've got some stuff to sort out, Mom," Percy told his mother. "Nico was in a bit of a fix when I found him and we've still got some things to sort out."

"So you'll be missing more school is what you're saying." Sally didn't look very happy about that.

"Sorry," Nico spoke up, "but I need Percy's help . . ."

Sally's expression immediately softened and she nodded. "You're welcome to stay here as long as you need to, Nico," she told him.

"Thank you, ma'am."

"But of course if you're going to be staying here, you'll have to stop being so formal and standing on ceremony," Sally said sternly. "You're family, after all. You're Percy's cousin." Percy could practically see the lightbulb lighting up above her head as the idea came. "Which actually makes me your aunt. If you must call me by some title, then you can call me Aunt Sally. Fair enough?"

Nico looked at her with wide, almost frightened eyes, then nodded shyly. "Yes . . . Aunt Sally."

Sally beamed then turned to Percy. "I assume that this is one of those demigod things that you're better off without mortal interference?"

Percy nodded.

"I'll trust you to know what you're doing then. And to look out for your cousin."

"Of course, Mom."

Sally looked satisfied. "And if there's anything Paul or I can do, you'll let us know, won't you?"

"I will."

"I don't want to find out that you've just been using this as an opportunity to get out of school."

"I won't, Mom," said Percy exasperatedly. "You can trust me." He decided not to mention that Nico didn't seem to attend any sort of school at all.

"Good." Sally turned to Nico and winked. "Keep him in line for me, alright Nico?"

* * *

Nico managed to stay awake the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon, which was pretty good for him, since he'd become nocturnal since his powers started developing. He was stronger at night and found it harder to sleep then, but weaker and sluggish during day-light hours. He and Percy watched sitcom reruns to pass the time, since there wasn't much they could do in the way of planning until they'd done more research, and not much they could do in the way of researching while they were in Percy's apartment. And going out of the apartment was not an option as far as Sally Jackson was concerned. She treated Nico like a sick invalid, making him put a thermometer under his tongue every hour to take his temperature, as though trying to make sure he didn't have a fever. Nico didn't see the point of this, considering that he had only slightly more body heat than the average post-rigor-mortis corpse, and the thermometer showed that, but he was too scared to argue with "Aunt" Sally. If he tried she'd only kill him with kindness. Or health food.

He took a nap before dinner when he nodded off on the sofa, but he woke up back in Percy's bed again, buried underneath the mountain of blankets Percy kept on his bed. He didn't mind the blankets. Most people seemed to think that just because he had almost no body heat that he didn't feel the cold, but there was a reason that he always wore a jacket. He liked being warm. But what annoyed him was that since he'd fallen asleep on the sofa, this meant that someone (and the someone was probably Percy) had picked him up and carried him again, like he was a helpless baby who couldn't do anything for himself. That really annoyed Nico.

Dinner wasn't too bad on Nico's health scale. Sally fixed carbonara pasta and didn't say anything when he drowned his salad in Ranch dressing. For desert there was homemade apple pie with vanilla ice cream, which made Nico think that perhaps, if Sally offered to adopt him, he might seriously consider her offer.

When the sun started to go down he finally felt normal again. No, not normal, actually. Better than normal. Stronger than before. His old demigod strength and powers felt like they'd been restored and then some. The change must have been obvious from his appearance too, because Percy finally stopped looking at him so worriedly.

"You look like you're feeling better," commented his cousin once the sun had set all the way.

"I do feel better," Nico told him. "Better than normal."

_It's because you have my power flowing through you,_ Anubis told him.

"Anubis says it's because I have his power in me," echoed Nico for Percy's benefit. "Though I'd rather have privacy inside my own head than a foreign god's power."

_I'd rather not be in your head to be honest, _Anubis told him. _I prefer to mind my own business and deal with the dead rather than the living._

_ Liar. I know you've been sneaking looks at my Mythomagic strategies. You think I can't tell which of my thoughts you're digging through?_

_ Your strategies border on lunacy and are of no use to me. I would destroy you in a match._

_ Is that a challenge?_ Nico looked to Percy who was looking knowingly at him. He seemed to be aware that his cousin was having a silent conversation with his parasite god. "Sorry," he told his cousin. He hadn't intended to leave Percy out. "So, apparently now I have access to a different kind of power. The same kind of magic that Sadie, Carter, and those House of Life freaks used. But using this kind of magic, and hosting a god in general will make me really hungry."

_Now who's spying on other peoples' thoughts?_

_ You started it._

"And your old powers?" Percy asked.

_You should still have access to those, _Anubis told Nico. _They might even be enhanced by the power that you get from me. It's possible that they'll tire you less but make you as hungry after using them as if you'd been using Egyptian magic._

Nico relayed this to Percy who considered it. "That would be good for you, at least," said Percy after a few moments. "It's a bit easier to carry you since I've grown some and you haven't –"

"Hey!"

"It's a fact, not an insult," Percy told him. "In the three years I've known you, you've only grown about two inches."

"Bianca said I'd gotten a lot taller that first time I summoned her," protested Nico.

"The dead often are mistaken where things that indicate the passage of time are concerned," said Anubis, accidentally taking over Nico's mouth. _Oops. Sorry._

"Stupid jackal. Mind your own business!" snapped Nico

Percy seemed to have picked up on the fact that something had just happened. Anubis had different inflections, Nico realized, and their accents were differed, with Nico's hinting towards an Italian upbringing and Anubis' hinting of an odd, ancient dialect. And Percy had noticed the difference.

"Was that Anubis who just spoke?" Percy asked.

"It was," Nico told him. He used past tense to let Percy know that he was the one who was in control now.

"So he's awake in your head right now?"

"He's always awake, since gods don't sleep. He just keeps most of his consciousness elsewhere most of the time," explained Nico.

"I've got something to say to him." Percy squared his shoulders and fixed Nico with such a stern look that it made Nico want to shuffle his feet and look away. "If you get Nico hurt there's going to be serious trouble for you. I'll make sure of it."

Nico expected Anubis to give a mental equivalent of rolling his eyes, and to remain unimpressed, but he surprised Nico by asking to address Percy directly. After a brief hesitation Nico gave his permission.

"It's not my intention to hurt your cousin," Anubis said to Percy. "Except for the times when we're figuring out how to untangle our souls, I'll keep my presence in his life to a minimum."

Percy gave a curt nod and Anubis withdrew back into Nico's consciousness. "So do you have any idea what to do next?" asked Percy. "Any god friends that might know how to unstick your soul from Nico's?"

"He thinks that Thoth might know how to help," Nico relayed when Anubis spoke inside his mind. "But he doesn't know where Thoth is. Thoth left the Duat and is somewhere in our world now, so he can't easily get ahold of him. But . . . but he knows someone who knows where he is. Two someones. Two someones who stole my jacket."

"Great," groaned Percy. "I'm sure they'll be real happy to see us after me and my horse broke their window and held them at sword point."

"They've got my boots too," Nico remembered. He looked down at his sock clad feet. He was wearing his own clothes again, except on his feet he still had Percy's socks. On Percy they probably only came up a few inches past his ankles, but Nico had to pull them up halfway to his knees so that they didn't flop loosely around is toes. There was no way he would be able to borrow a pair of Percy's shoes. Not unless he wanted to break his neck by tripping over them all the way to Brooklyn. Not that they really needed to walk to the Kanes' place . . .

"When should we go?" asked Percy.

Nico gave him an impish grin and began bending the shadows around them with his mind. It was time to test out how strong his powers were now that they were boosted by an Egyptian god. "How about now?"

* * *

AN: I'm always bugging people for book recommendations, so I figure it's only fair if I share one now and then. So if anyone's looking for a good book to read this summer and wants something along the lines of the _Kane Chronicles_, I recommend _The Pharaoh's Secret_ by Marissa Moss. It's a modern day mystery about ancient Egypt, with some magic thrown in. I read it over the winter and just remembered it when a friend who just finished _The Red Pyramid_ asked me for a similar book to borrow.

In the next chapter: Bast learns what the Kanes have been up to while she's been gone, Nico gets his jacket back, Aziza and Hakim return, and Percy gets insulted because for once, everyone's not trying to kill him. Please review and tell me what you think!


	6. Chapter 6

6

Sadie wasn't sure which was worse: Bast telling them what she had seen while spying on the First Nome, or her and Carter confessing to Bast what had happened in her absence.

"Please let me make sure that I understand this right," Bast almost purred, but there was a very dangerous edge to her voice. "You ventured back into Manhattan, after being told only to go there in emergencies-"

"It was an emergency," Sadie interjected. "We were kind of running for our lives."

"-and drug a random demigod into your duel with two House of Life magicians. A random demigod who just happened to be the son of Hades, Lord of the Greek Underworld. And after he passed out, you brought said demigod here, into your own home, and allowing him past all the protection spells that your uncle fortified this house with?"

"We didn't know he was a demigod," said Carter, sounding much too cowed. Sadie wished that her brother would show some backbone, even though she felt about how he sounded. But it was never good to let anyone see you feeling guilty. "Let alone the son of Hades. We thought he was a magician like us."

"The corpse that he summoned to fight for him didn't give you any clues?" demanded Bast.

"Why would it have?" asked Sadie, doing her best to sound flippant. "Zia told us some magicians have affinities for necromancy."

"Necromancy doesn't work like that," said Bast angrily. "Not on decomposing, unprepared corpses. And reanimation doesn't work on corpses that have brains in their heads at all! The only thing a magician _might_ have been able to use that body for was as a medium to speak with the dead. Not as his personal bodyguard!"

Sadie shrugged. "I guess we've seen too many mummy movies. Hollywood makes it seem like we should be expecting something like in The Mummy Returns."

"Perhaps you forgot the part where those reanimations had been mummified!" returned Bast. "As in properly prepared for necromancy."

"We didn't know," said Carter. "We're sorry, Bast, but we really thought he was just a necromancer."

"_Just_ a necromancer?" Bast's eyes flashed with a dangerous light, and Sadie had the feeling that necromancers weren't looked upon much more kindly than modern grave robbers.

"What did you want us to do?" asked Sadie, propping her feet up on the patio table and leaning back in her chair. "Pin a thank you note to his shirt and leave him there for the House of Life to take in? Yeah. Because that would be a _great_ way to repay him."

"No worse than kidnapping him!"

"We didn't kidnap him!" protested Carter. "That was all a misunderstanding. I mean, he had a god stuck in his head and had no idea what was going on. He wasn't even awake at all the first four days, and when he woke up the first time it was only for ten minutes! No, not even that long!"

Bast looked disgusted. "And the next time he awoke he found that he was trapped in his room, and so he contacted one of his demigod friends to come to his rescue!"

"Actually, Percy's my cousin." The voice came from right behind Sadie and made her jump about five feet in the air. Her chair clattered as she turned around as quickly as she could. Bast hissed and drew her knives and Carter got to his feet as well. Standing about three feet away with their backs to the balcony's rails stood Death Boy Nico di Angelo, and his trusty sidekick Percy the Pegasus Riding Sword Freak.

"Uh, hi," said Carter sounding rather dim. "Welcome back?"

"Ugh," said Bast, "I don't know which is worse. The fact that he's Hades' spawn or that he's hosting that flea ridden _dog_."

Nico's face had been calm and a bit amused, but his expression quickly twisted into an enraged one and he took a step toward Bast, giving her a glare that would peel paint. "I'm not a dog," he growled in a voice that was lower that Nico's usual voice, and had a slightly different accent.

"Anubis?" Sadie asked hopefully.

Nico/Anubis turned to her and gave a polite nod, then turned to glare at Bast again and bared his teeth savagely. It was kind of funny to see wee little Nico with his lower jaw jutted forward and his teeth clenched and lips raised to show off all those pearly whites. Some of his teeth were actually quite sharp looking, but didn't do much to lend him any intimidation power. He looked no more dangerous than an angry kitten.

"Hey, whoa. Settle down you two . . . er . . . three?" Apparently Percy had some counting problems. But then, Sadie wasn't exactly sure how many people/entities should be counted in this situation either. Did Nico and Anubis count as one or two since they were sharing the same body?

Nico/Anubis blinked. Once, twice, then his expression cleared and he looked confused for a moment, like he'd forgotten how to use his face muscles. He either stumbled or his knees buckled, because he almost fell, but Percy grabbed onto the collar of his shirt and kept him upright. When the boy spoke, it was with Nico in control. "We need to see Thoth," he told the Kanes and Bast. "I need to find a way to get our souls untangled."

"There's something else should probably do first, Death Boy," said Sadie. "If you haven't already."

Nico's expression grew wary. "What's that?"

"How about checking in with dear-old-dad?"

"No."

"Uh, Nico?" said Carter. "I actually think that you should contact your dad and let him know you're alright."

"And I really think you should mind your own business."

"Just about all us demigods have daddy issues," said Percy, almost apologetically.

"Actually, you checking in with your dad is our business," said Sadie, ignoring Percy's remark. "Because last we heard, he thought that you'd been kidnapped by the House of Life and he's planning on starting a war with them to get you back."

_"What?"_

"You heard me, Death Boy."

"My father wouldn't . . . he's not the kind of dad who . . . you don't know what you're talking about," stammered Nico.

"It's true," said Bast. "I was in the First Nome when he sent his furies as messengers. Hades somehow found out that you were in a fight with the House of Life and thinks that they kidnapped you. If you don't contact him and let him know that that's wrong then he's going to start a war with the House of Life in less than three days now."

"And if I do contact him he'll realize that I'm possessed by one of you Egyptian gods, and start a war with your pantheon," returned Nico.

"Neither of these are very good options," muttered Carter.

Sadie shot him an annoyed look. "You think?"

"That's why we want to see Thoth," Percy spoke up. "Anubis thinks that if anyone has the knowledge of how to fix Nico and Anubis, then it's Thoth."

"But since Thoth left the Du-whatever Anubis doesn't know where he is," said Nico. "But he knows that you guys do."

"Why don't we go inside and discuss this?" suggested Carter, throwing out his first intelligent comment of the night, as far as Sadie was concerned.

"You should not invite demigods into your home," hissed Bast.

"Why not?" asked Sadie. "Are they bad luck or something?"

"They've already been inside," said Carter. "Besides, they're not our enemies. If we don't all work together then there's going to be a war, and whether it's Hades versus the House of Life or Hades versus the Egyptian gods, the consequences aren't going to be good for Sadie and I."

So they went inside and sat down in the Great Room and prepared to get serious. Things got a little less serious when Nico spotted Khufu, and jumped up from his seat looking alarmed. Percy took his cue from his cousin and stood as well, and drew a weapon from somewhere. One second his hands were empty, the next he had a glowing bronze sword in them and looked ready to reenact a scene from _The Clash of the Titans_.

Bast stood up at once too and drew her knives, ready to fight, but Percy and Nico didn't attack. Percy stayed in his guarded stance and looked at Nico confused. Nico stared at Khufu like he'd just come face to face with the devil. "Godsdamned monkey!"

"He's not a monkey, he's a baboon," Sadie corrected him. "Shouldn't you know that with Anubis in your head and all? Anubis likes baboons."

"He does. I don't." Nico hadn't drawn a weapon but continued to glare at Khufu.

"Agh," Khufu said, taking a seat at their little council. Nico looked like he was about to have a heart attack. Then suddenly his face calmed and he sat down.

"Nico seems to have an irrational fear of baboons and monkeys," said Anubis, speaking through Nico. "So in the interest of settling this as quickly as possible, I will be taking over for now."

"Hey," protested Percy. "I can't agree to that."

"You of all people should understand the need to avoid a war involving gods," said Anubis.

"I want another war as much as I want another ice age," said Percy, "but Nico's my cousin and I can't just sit by while you trap him in his own head. That's his body. I want you to give it back to him."

Anubis was silent for a moment, then Nico spoke. "I've made a deal with Anubis. He can talk for now since he knows more about this Egypt stuff than me. But in return I want my jacket and boots back. Now."

"Fair enough." Carter went to go get Nico's stuff. He returned a minute later and Nico stood up. Sadie saw that he had been walking around without shoes and only stockings to protect his feet. She watched with some amusement as he slipped on his boots and quickly laced them up, and couldn't hold back a chuckle.

"What?" asked Nico looking annoyed.

"Nothing. Just thinking that you, me, and Anubis all have similar taste." She thumped her own combat-boot-clad feet down on the table. "Anubis wears them too."

Nico shrugged into his jacket and checked his pockets to make sure that they hadn't nicked his money before he sat down. Then he cocked his head to one side and jumped up again.

"Now what is it, Dog?" Bast demanded.

"Trouble. Don't you hear it you mangy alley-cat?" asked Anubis.

Bast went still then jumped up as well and landed on the table. Out came her knives, while Anubis reached into Nico's pocket and pulled out his switchblade. He hit the button to release the blade and then something happened. One second it was a knife, the next it was a three-foot-long sword of wicked looking black metal. Percy had his bronze sword out again in an instant, but Sadie could have sworn that before it was a sword his weapon was an ink pen.

Sadie and Carter got up as quickly as they could. "What is it?" Sadie wanted to know.

"How did it get past the wards?" asked Carter.

"It's upstairs," said Anubis.

"In one of the guest rooms. The one you let the dog stay in, I believe," said Bast.

"I'm not a dog!"

"You're a fool is what you are. You're probably the ones who broke the wards on that window."

"And how could I have done that?"

"With your blood, you filthy mutt."

"That black blood you painted on the window melted the glass," explained Carter. "It must have melted the protections too."

"That's impossible."

"Then how else did _they_ get in?"

They turned out to be a dozen magicians from the House of Life, led by the two magicians that Carter and Sadie had run into earlier that week in Central Park. The woman who'd wrapped Nico in the ribbons of Hathor, and thus was responsible for all their problems, seemed to be leading them. She pulled out her staff as she walked up to the balcony rail and gave Nico/Anubis a nasty smile.

"Hello again, pet," she told him.

The room seemed to darken, like the shadows were getting thicker. "What did you call me?" growled Anubis.

Instead of answering, the magician flung the ribbons of Hathor at Nico/Anubis again, probably figured if they'd worked the first time . . .

She didn't count on Nico's cousin slicing them into pocket lint before they made it anywhere near the demigodling.

"Celestial bronze," the magician noted. "Another filthy demigod."

"Aziza," said one of the other magicians, one who Sadie didn't recognize. "Which is the son of Hades?"

"Which do you think?" said the female magician, Aziza. "It's the one who looks like the walking corpse!" She pointed her staff at Nico. "Take the son of Hades alive. If the other demigod runs, don't chase him. We don't need him. But the two little heretics we'll need as the tribute Lord Hades demanded. So take them either dead or alive."

* * *

Percy was insulted. He almost couldn't believe he'd been discounted so easily by the House of Life magicians. He knew that it was petty and juvenile but . . . he was used to people seeing him as important, or at least as significant. The son of one of the Big Three, the one everyone thought would fulfill the last Great Prophecy . . . he wasn't quite sure why he was insulted now that people didn't want to kill him.

But he was insulted. More than that, he was pissed off. Worrying about Nico seemed to be turning into a very stressful full-time job, and everything seemed to keep getting in his way. From the parasite god that was trapped in Nico's head, to the House of Life freaks who were responsible for the mess in the first place.

He was glad to have a chance to take his frustration out on someone.

The battle began in earnest. And by in earnest, I mean with a very loud explosion as one of the magicians destroyed half the Great Room with a fireball.

"You bloody bastards!" roared Sadie. "Do you know how long it took to put this room back together last time?"

Something else flew through the air and exploded right in front of Nico, sending him flying backwards. Nico crashed onto the table and rolled off the other side. Percy moved to cover his friend. He batted another fire ball off its course with his bare hand, very glad that he'd taken that bath in the River Styx and gotten that invulnerability. If not for that, he would have been unnerved at having to fight against so many magicians.

"Are you okay?" he asked his cousin.

Nico nodded.

"Which one are you?" Percy wanted to know. He needed to know who he had fighting with him in this battle. If it was Nico he could guess better how he would act. If it was Anubis he was going to have more trouble keeping Nico out of the magicians' hands since he didn't know what the god would do or how he fought.

"Nico," his cousin said. "Percy, are our weapons going to work on these guys?"

Percy hadn't thought of that. Celestial bronze and Stygian iron were great against monsters and the supernatural, but not so much against mortals, and he wasn't sure which one the House of Life freaks classified as. "I don't know." He watched as Sadie and Carter began countering with spells. Bast disarmed one magician and dodged a handful of those troublesome ribbons.

"Here's our chance to find out," said Nico, as Aziza and the other magician from the park moved to charge them.

"I'll take the girl," Percy said, just as Aziza shouted to her friend, "Hakim! Take the other demigod. I'll take Hades' son!"

_Well, this complicates things, _thought Percy. He took the first move and charged Aziza.

"Get out of my way!" the magician screamed shrilly. She whacked at Percy with her staff. He ducked under it and tried to cut her but she dodged. Out the corner of his eye he saw Nico start fighting Hakim. He didn't have time to watch for long. Aziza went on the attack, and Percy had to admit that she was good. He wasn't used to fighting someone with a staff. The closest thing he was used to were spears and they were quite different. For one thing they weren't constantly casting offensive spells at him, which he either had to dodge or deflect. Some of them got through his guard but didn't really hurt him, but some would have been troublesome if he hadn't deflected them, like the spider-web that Aziza accidentally hit one of her own men with. It stuck him to the wall like gum on a hot summer day.

_This is taking too long, _thought Percy._ I'm spending far too long on one enemy._ Nico had already taken down Hakim by smashing the hilt of his sword into Hakim's head. He had also taken down several others and didn't seem to be hurt. But Sadie was bleeding from a cut on her arm that was gushing and Carter seemed to be tiring quickly too. Bast stayed in constant motion so it was hard to tell what she was up to. Percy thought that they were winning, but then Aziza decided to light the entire room on fire.

She jumped away from him, leaping like a grasshopper and spun her staff around above her head like it was a helicopter propeller and she was trying to fly. Red light shot out of both end and spread around the perimeters of the room. "I'm through with playing around!" she shouted and stopped spinning her staff. She pointed it at the flames and then they started moving according to her will, rushing forward to spin around Nico like a cyclone of embers and brimstone. Nico looked panicked at is closed in on him and held up his arms to protect his face.

"No!" Percy shouted and looked around wildly. _Water. I need water! The plumbing!_ He could feel it now that he was thinking about it. Water running through pipes in the walls. He called to it and it answered, swelling to bust out of its pipes and through the walls with as much pressure as a high powered fire hose.

"You'll have to do better than that!" screamed Aziza and began spinning her staff again to call up more fire.

Nico darted to Percy's side. "This is getting dangerous," he said, sticking close to Percy.

"You're right. We need to get out of here." But Percy didn't see how they could. There were still too many magicians left standing and Aziza was going crazy with her fire again.

"I think I know a way out," said Nico. "But I need you to get rid of the fire. All of it. Sadie! Carter! Get close!"

"What are you thinking, Nico?" Percy wanted to know. Nico had an odd, kind of crazy expression on his face. Like he was thinking about trying something really stupid.

"No time to explain! Cat Woman! You too! Get close!"

Their Egyptian counterparts obeyed Nico's order. As soon as Nico judged they were close enough he gave Percy a nod and Percy summoned the water again. Even before he doused all of Aziza's flames the room seemed to darken. Nico was bending the shadows, Percy realized. Then it clicked what his cousin was going to do.

"Nico, don't!" he shouted as the last of the flames hissed and fizzled into steam. "There's too many of us!"

But Nico, being Nico, ignored him, or maybe didn't even hear him. The water hissing was very loud and the steam obscured sound, muffling everything. The air around them was thick with shadows now, but Percy managed to see Nico link his right arm through Sadie's, then reach out further with it to grab ahold of both Carter's and Bast's clothes. Then Nico wrapped his left arm around Percy like he was trying to hug him. And they were flying through shadows at the speed of darkness.

The next thing Percy knew they were somewhere else. Somewhere dark but warm, even humid. In the moonlight he could see the silhouettes of gravestones in the mist and he saw that Carter, Sadie, and Bast had made it too. Nico released them and slumped against Percy who caught him and lowered him the rest of the way to the ground.

"Nico? Hey, look at me."

"Look at you?" muttered Nico. "You always have to be the center of attention, don't you Percy?"

Percy chuckled despite himself. "Oh ha ha. Very funny. I can't believe you managed to pull that off." He had been impressed with how far Nico's powers had progressed when Nico managed to shadow travel them both into the Kanes' balcony. A few months ago Nico hadn't been able to take even one passenger along. Now he had just taken four and gotten them . . . "Where did you bring us?"

Nico's eyes drooped and he lowered his head sleepily.

"What the bloody hell was that?" demanded Sadie, having apparently just recovered.

"Is he alright?" was Carter's first concern.

"He's fine," Percy told them. _I think,_ he added mentally. "He's just tired. Shadow traveling takes a lot out of him."

"Well," said Bast, sounding reluctantly impressed, "that is certainly a useful trick."

"We're not in China are we?" Nico asked, looking up again.

Percy looked around. There were numerals on the gravestones for the dates and the letters were English. Some of them were even carved like tree stumps. "I don't think so. Why? Were you trying to take us to China?"

"No. I just always seem to end up there when I mess up. Percy, I'm hungry. You got anything to eat?"

Percy reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a packet of blue jelly beans. He sat Nico up so that his back was to a gravestone carved to look like a tree-stump, so he wouldn't choke, then tore the wrapper open for him when Nico fumbled it with clumsy fingers.

"I could've done it," said Nico petulantly.

"Of course you could have." Percy sat down beside him to rest for a moment. "Where were you trying to take us?"

"Ashville Cemetery, North Carolina." Nico seemed to perk up at the taste of sugar. "I think we made it too." He tapped the gravestone behind him. "There's a lot of gravestones carved like tree-stumps there. Here. In Ashville, if we are in Ashville, I mean. The cemetery, not the city itself because-"

"We get it, Nico," Percy told him.

"So we're in North Carolina?" asked Carter.

"I think so," answered Nico.

"That's good. We're a lot closer to Thoth from here than we were in New York," said Carter.

"If we start driving within the hour then we'll be there before morning," said Bast. "It would probably be best to drive instead of using a portal. The House of Life will be watching all of those now, I'll bet my life on it. They're on high alert now."

"Will they be keeping tabs on Thoth too?" asked Carter.

"Possibly. But Thoth is very powerful, and can't be easily defeated once he's rooted in a place of knowledge. Once we reach his stronghold we should be safe."

"Safe is good," muttered Nico. He finished off the pack of jellybeans and stuffed the wrapper in his pocket. Then he got to his feet using the gravestone for support.

"Whoa, hey! Where are you going?" demanded Percy.

Nico pointed. "Mausoleum. We should get inside."

"Why?"

"Because there are more people in graveyards at night than you'd think," Nico told him. "Wiccans, voodoo priests, emo-goth kids on dates, grief-stricken humans, muggers, grave robbers, murderers who want to dispose of bodies, lunatics, necrophiliacs –"

"We get the point," said Sadie. "And I'm pretty sure we could take on any of those. Except maybe the Wiccans." She turned to Bast. "Are Wiccans real? I mean do they have real magic powers?"

Percy tuned out the theological discussion that the two girls got into and focused on making sure Nico didn't take an unexpected trip smack into a gravestone. But the blue jellybeans seemed to have done the trick, and Nico seemed a lot stronger and more alert than Percy expected him to be. He walked up to the closest mausoleum without stumbling once, even though he walked rather slowly.

"How are we going to get in?" Percy started to ask, then shut up. Nico simply put his hand against the door and Percy heard the locking mechanism click. The heavy door swung open at the touch of the death god's son. It creaked eerily, like a sound effect from a horror movie, and Nico walked right in as though the mausoleum was his own home.

"Um? Hello? Shouldn't we be going and getting a car?" asked Sadie. "Not hanging out in a mausoleum?"

Nico hopped up onto the raised sarcophagus in the center of the mausoleum and laid down on top of it like it was a bed. "You can. I'm taking a nap."

Percy backed his cousin up. "Nico needs to rest. You have no idea how taxing what he just did was."

"Without my powers, it probably would have been impossible," said a voice right beside Percy. "Or it would have put him in a coma."

Riptide was at the stranger's throat in an instant. "Who are you?" Percy demanded of the black clad stranger. The newcomer was about the same age as Percy was, sixteen years old. His skin was pale and he had shaggy black hair and brown eyes. He seemed strangely familiar, though Percy knew he had never seen him before. But maybe it was just because he looked enough like Nico to be his big brother.

"Anubis!" Sadie was suddenly very happy to come on inside the mausoleum to stand next to the strange boy.

"Anubis?" asked Percy. He looked at Nico, who was reluctantly sitting up, then back at the stranger. "You're Anubis?"

Anubis moved Riptide away from his throat gingerly with two fingers. "I am."

"I thought you were possessing my cousin."

Anubis and Nico spoke at the same time.

"I am."

"He is."

Percy's confusion must have shown on his face.

"I have the power to inhabit any graveyard or place of mourning," Anubis explained. "I can divide my consciousness amongst quite a few places. Right now I am inhabiting this graveyard and your cousin, while continuing my duties in the Egyptian underworld."

"You know," said Nico, pointing at Anubis. Or actually pointing about a foot off from Anubis, while looking at him. "You look familiar. I've seen you somewhere before."

"Yes, Nico," Anubis said impatiently. "In the Halls of Judgment."

"No, not there. Somewhere else."

"You should have something else to eat. It will put you in a better state of mind."

"Why don't you give him a dog bone then?" Bast asked snidely.

Anubis turned toward Bast and suddenly he changed. One minute he was a normal looking dude. The next he looked like the Anubis Percy had seen in his history books: bare chested and wearing one of those Egyptian kilts, with a jackal head and a lot of gold jewelry. He growled at Bast and Percy almost swore he saw the woman's hair rise up on end.

"Hey!" Percy said quickly before things could turn violent. "Don't we have things to be discussing? Shouldn't we be planning how to stop an inter-pantheon war rather than fighting amongst ourselves?"

"Or we could be sleeping," said Nico helpfully.

Anubis morphed back to his human form and folded his arms across his chest. "Yes. We have much to discuss. That's why I came here before you like this, so that I could speak to all of you face to face, rather than through Nico. That gets confusing."

"That gets schizophrenic," Nico corrected him.

Anubis gave his human host an impatient look. "And Nico doesn't need any help causing confusion."

"Hey, give him a break," said Percy. "He's only twelve years old, he lost all his memories from the first ten years of his life, and now he's being possessed by a god of death. If he wasn't confused then I'd be worried."

"Hmph. Your loyalty to your cousin is commendable at least." Anubis looked at his host. "You're lucky. You could have ended up with an obnoxious spoiled-brat like Horus as your kinsman."

Nico seemed to be making an effort to get his head back in the game. He rubbed his eyes to fight off drowsiness and blinked several times. "What did you come here to say, Anubis?"

"I think you should tell Carter and Sadie about your heart scarab."

"What? No!" Now Nico crossed his arms over his chest, mimicking Anubis' early motion.

"Carter studied archeology under his father. Julius Kane had more knowledge about magic and the old ways than any human had had for centuries."

Nico's expression went blank and he looked at Carter and Sadie. "Which one of them is Julius?"

"Their father," said Anubis irritably. "Show them the scarab."

Nico shook his head defiantly.

"What scarab?" Carter asked.

"Somehow, between the time when Nico's soul was flayed by the ribbons of Hathor, and the time when he woke up from his four-day long coma, Nico's heart was replaced by a stone scarab."

"Impossible," said Bast. "The demigod would be dead if that happened."

"Show them, Nico," ordered Anubis.

Nico glared at him. "I don't want to. You know I don't want to. You know I wanted that kept secret –"

"And I would have respected that had we not just been given a deadline," Anubis told him. "But we have less than three days to figure out a way to separate our souls, so that you can face your father without him realizing you're possessed and deciding to start a war with us."

"We could always just let him take out the House of Life," suggested Sadie. "That's starting to sound better and better."

"What? You're joking, right?" Carter turned on his sister.

"Of course I'm joking," snapped Sadie. "I'm not a fool. I know we're going to need those idiots when we fight against Apophis. Especially since our recruiting efforts aren't going very well."

Percy wasn't crazy about Nico showing his heart scarab to Sadie and Carter. He wasn't sure if it the scarab was a weakness or some new source of strength for Nico or what, but common sense said that you didn't freely give that information to people you didn't trust. But the Kanes knew about it now, since Anubis couldn't seem to keep his muzzle shut. And he did have a point about the time limit.

Nico looked at Percy as though asking his opinion. Percy frowned but nodded, hoping that would convey what he was thinking. Nico seemed to understand and nodded back before unzipping his jacket and removing it, then taking off his T-shirt.

"Hmm," said Carter as he moved closer to get a better look. "Very interesting."

"Yes. Interesting. That's me." Nico shivered slightly and rubbed the goosebumps on his arms.

"You didn't need to take off your shirt, you know," Sadie told him. "This is not a Calvin Klein ad."

"Well I wasn't going to pull it up to my collarbone and hold it there," said Nico angrily. "I saw way too many girls doing that last time I was in New Orleans and I don't want to be imitating them."

"New Orleans?" Anubis looked sharply at Nico.

"Yes. The drowned city. Big pretty graveyards. Good music. Madri Gras. And best of all, Cajun food." Nico smiled wistfully at the last item on his list. "I love Cajun food. It's the only cuisine in the world that can rival McDonalds."

"You're weird," Sadie told him.

"Focus, please," said Percy as his cousin shivered again. "Nico, put on your jacket, at least. Carter, do you know anything about that scarab?"

"The scarab itself was an Egyptian symbol of rebirth-"

"Yes, we know," said Nico. "Get to the stuff we don't know."

"The ancient Egyptians carved hundreds of thousands of them, it was that important to them. They'd put them over-"

"Over the hearts of mummies and later started replacing the hearts of mummies with them. They had a god whose entire head was a giant scarab named Khepri. They thought that the sun was a flaming ball of dung rolled across the sky by a scarab. Yes, we know all that. What else can you tell us?" Nico pulled on his jacket, obeying Percy's order, and shoved his hands into his pockets while glaring at Carter.

Carter faltered a bit under Nico's scrutiny. "Well . . . it has wings."

"No? Really?"

"Most scarabs weren't carved this elaborately. I assume you know that real scarabs don't have wings with feathers, but in Egyptian symbolism, adding wings to something associated it with the divine or with the afterlife. Most of the time, anyway. So the fact that yours has bird wings means that it's special."

"Really? Wow." Nico was glaring daggers at Carter now. Then he turned his head quickly and grinned at Percy. "You hear that, Percy? It's a special scarab. I guess that makes me special too! My freaking heart was replaced by a _special_ stone carved to look like a glorified dung beetle when I got myself possessed by the Egyptian god of corpse desecration! Yay for me!"

"Sorry," Carter told them, shrinking away from the angry demigodling. "I did the best I could. I'm kind of new at this magic stuff too. I don't know what the significance of it replacing your heart is, or why the Egyptians suddenly started changing the embalming process."

"Don't blame this on my brother," spoke up Sadie. "This is not his fault."

Nico pulled off his jacket again, put his shirt back on, then replaced his jacket. "So where's this Thoth guy who might know what the heck is going on?"

"Thoth is currently in Memphis," Carter told them.

"Memphis, Egypt?" asked Percy warily. He really wasn't in the mood for a trip by plane, which would end with him getting shot out of the sky, and there was no way Nico was fit to shadow travel them halfway around the world

"Memphis, Tennessee," said Carter.

Percy wished that he'd paid more attention in geography classes, and that he knew how far away that was.

"Pretty close," said Nico, looking thoughtful. "I like Elmwood Cemetery. It's nice."

"You death-god types are so messed up," said Sadie, looking back and forth between Nico and Anubis. The death god and his demigod host both shrugged simultaneously without even looking at each other. Nico seemed distracted, and too late Percy realized that he'd gotten that crazy look in his eyes again.

"Nico," he started to say warningly, but then his cousin reached out and grabbed him with both hands. The shadows in the mausoleum thickened like someone had slammed the door shut, but Percy was pretty sure it was still open. The next thing Percy knew he was flying through icy darkness, and the only relative warmth he felt was Nico's cool hands on his wrists.

Then he hit the ground. Hard, like someone had tossed him out of a moving car. Thankfully the ground was grassy and soft, and he missed hitting any tombstones. Around him he heard grunts and thuds and groans of pain as Carter, Bast, and Sadie got the same rough treatment. Perhaps even rougher treatment, since it seem like this time Nico had bent the shadows around them and towed them along without direct contact. Percy hadn't even known that was possible.

He turned to Nico who was lying beside him, still gripping his wrists tight enough to cut off circulation. Percy supposed he should have been flattered that Nico made sure to use the tried and true method of shadow traveling with him, to make sure that he didn't accidentally drop Percy somewhere along Route 66 or the Mississippi River. But he saw something right behind his cousin that made him cringe.

It was the writing on the tombstones. Percy wasn't very good at English, of course, but he was fairly good at recognizing it and distinguishing it from other languages like Italian and German. Unfortunately the writing on the graves was neither of those. It was some sort of Asian language.

"Nico," groaned Percy, "I've got some bad news. I think you just dropped us in China."

* * *

"China?" Nico's eyelids fluttered like butterfly wings as he struggled to open them. "Oh no . . ."

Nico looked so pathetic that Carter couldn't help but feel sorry for the kid. Then something occurred to him.

"Wait," said Carter. "We can't be in China. It's daylight there right now. Unless we lost some time somehow?"

"You're not in China."

Carter jumped as the familiar voice of his favorite death god came from right behind them.

"Anubis!" Sadie always seemed so happy to see Anubis. Carter wondered why his sister was so weird.

"Where are we then?" asked Percy, as he pried Nico's fingers from his wrists.

"Elmwood Cemetery, in Memphis, Tennessee," said Anubis. "There just happen to be quite a few Asian American graves with their native writing on the stones in this graveyard. But we're exactly where Nico was trying to go. Though I don't think taking two humans, a god, and a demigod along for the ride was a very wise move, Nico."

"I hung on tight to Percy," said Nico.

Carter guessed that must have meant something, but wasn't quite sure what. He was almost positive that he saw the corner of Anubis' eye start twitching, and guessed that there was something unpleasant, or potentially unpleasant about the matter that they weren't being told. He decided not to ask.

"So we're in Memphis. That's really good," said Bast. "I suppose having a demigodling around can be useful. Mind you it's his fault we're in this mess to begin with."

"You guys were the ones who got him involved in your fight," said Percy, helping his cousin to his feet.

"He got involved on his own," said Sadie.

Percy looked at her like she was stupid. "He's a demigod. A Greek hero. Do you think he could have stood by and let you two get killed by some magical force without doing anything? The minute you landed on him you involved him."

"We're not the ones who put a chunk of rock in his chest, or a god in his head," said Sadie. "Not that that's your fault, Anubis."

Anubis gave Sadie a rare smile then turned to Bast. "We should go see Thoth immediately. We are on a time-limit, after all."

"When you say we . . ." Sadie trailed off making it a question.

"My consciousness will be going with Nico," answered Anubis. "I cannot leave the cemetery in this manifestation."

Carter was relieved. He didn't want a continuous cat and dog battle between the two Egyptian gods that were with them. With Anubis chilling in Nico's skull it would probably be a lot more peaceful.

"Nico? Hey? Can you stand?"

Carter turned to watch Percy's attempts to help his cousin wake up, but Nico seemed to be literally asleep on his feet. His eyelids seemed like they were weighted down, but he was fighting to open them, but it was a losing battle. His knees buckled and he would have fallen if Percy wasn't holding him up.

"Nico? Well, this is great." Percy looked quite frustrated.

"He needs food more than he needs rest," Anubis told him. "Again, he's drawing on my power. What he did definitely wouldn't have been possible any other way. Get him a good meal and he'll come around. Until then expect him to act like he swallowed half a bottle of sleeping pills. Or maybe just a third a bottle. Half would kill a normal human his weight, he's so skinny."

Nico managed to pry his eyelids open at the perceived insult. "Am not!"

"Are too. Trust me. I'm the god of death. I know all the doses and weight conversions for just about every drug people try to kill themselves with."

"I bet you're real fun at parties," said Carter. He brushed some of the grass off his clothes and straightened his collar.

"We should probably be going," said Sadie. She looked at Anubis rather reluctantly. Carter had to wonder what the heck was wrong with his sister. She couldn't really have a thing for the jackal headed death god . . . could she?

Anubis nodded, gave Sadie another of his rare smiles, and then seemed to fade into the mist.

* * *

AN: Thank you everyone who gave me recommendations for books you think I'll like. I'll be going to the beach with some friends soon, so I'll be stocking up on books for the car trip. I love summer vacation!

Next Chapter: Nico gets a piggy-back ride (and some horrible news about his true nationality), everyone's favorite (and least favorite) Egyptian hippie returns for a BBQ (and to shed some light on our heroes' situation), and my horrible poetry skills are revealed as I attempt to create a rhyming prophecy.

I've also figured out what I want to do with this AU, and by the next chapter, I'll have revealed enough of this story's plot that I can talk about it and get some opinions from you guys about it. For now, please let me know what you think of what I've written so far and review!


	7. Chapter 7

7

Bast went on ahead to get them a car. Carter, Sadie, and Percy began walking to the cemetery's edge, with Percy carrying Nico piggy-back style. Carter was glad to be spared that task. He remembered how hard it had been carrying Nico in Central Park, like the kid's aura was sucking the life out of him. Apparently demigods were more resilient than normal humans, and even magicians. Carter had been impressed with how Percy had batted the House of Life magicians' fireballs aside with his bare hand, like he was resistant to fire. He guessed that demigods had some sort of magic immunity, or at least that Percy did. Carter remembered what Anubis had told him about Nico's powers being linked to death, which was what made the Ribbons of Hathor so dangerous to him. He guessed that Percy would have fared better against them.

"So which god is your father?" Carter asked Percy asked they walked. "Zeus or Poseidon? Or is your mother a goddess, like Hera or Demeter? Or are you and Nico actually second cousins, rather than first cousins? Because if I remember right, there's a lot more options that way."

"My father's Poseidon," said Percy. "God of the Seas. So that makes Nico and I first cousins, technically speaking."

"Technically speaking?" asked Sadie. "If your fathers are brothers then that makes you cousins in any way of speaking. That's what cousins are. People whose parents are your parents' siblings."

"It doesn't exactly work that way for demigods," Percy tried to explain. "Our gods don't have DNA. So if you gave Nico and I a blood test it would show us as unrelated. We usually don't refer to other demigods whose god-parent is a sibling to our god-parent as our cousins, or acknowledge any sort of family bond."

"Then . . . why are things different with you and Nico?" asked Carter. "If you don't mind me asking.

Percy paused to hoist Nico higher onto his back so that the boy wouldn't fall. Nico's head rested on his shoulder, but Percy didn't seem to mind, probably because Nico didn't seem to be drooling. "We've been through a lot together," said Percy at last. "We're friends, first. Acknowledging that we're cousins makes things easier in the outside world a lot of the time. And . . . well, I owe Nico."

"Do not." Nico's voice was muffled since he was speaking against Percy's shoulder, but his words were able to be understood.

"I thought you were sleeping," said Percy, looking surprised.

"Why would you think you owed me?" asked Nico. "I owed you, remember? You said so at the Styx. Styx . . . Cerberus likes sticks. He likes to chew on them. I bet he likes to chew on jackals too. Ha ha."

"Why don't you try to take a nap, Nico?" suggested Percy.

"But you said I owed you. You don't remember?" asked Nico. "Maybe it's because you're ADHD. I'm not though. At least I was never diagnosed as that by a shrink. At least I don't think I was. They didn't have that when I was growing up."

"You still are growing up. And you made up for what you owed me by showing up at Olympus with your father and your undead army."

"That was fun," said Nico. "Best party invitation I ever got. But why would you owe me if that made up for what I owed you?"

Carter guessed that Nico was being like Cerberus with a stick about that owing thing, but he was interested to hear the answer. And interested to hear more about this party involving Olympus, Hades, and an army of undead, but he figured now wasn't the best time to ask about that.

"I owe you for breaking my promise," said Percy. It sounded like he was trying to keep his voice down so that Carter and Sadie wouldn't hear, or maybe just so they'd know that he didn't want them hearing and they weren't welcome to ask questions.

"Promise? What promise?" asked Nico.

"Bianca," said Percy. He paused like he was waiting for a response, then he stumbled a step. "Nico . . . I'm not positive because of the invulnerability thing, but it kind of feels like you're trying to bite me . . ."

"Agh em!" Nico said, then moved his mouth away from Percy's shoulder. "I mean, I am! You didn't break your promise. You told me there weren't any guarentees on quests. You just promised to try. And you did try. I saw . . . in my nightmares. I said I was sorry about being a brat, Percy. I'm still sorry." Suddenly he shoved at Percy's back, dislodging himself and causing Percy to drop him. He landed on the ground without even attempting to break his fall, and didn't even try to get up. "Is that why you're nice to me? Because you think you owe me? You don't, Percy. You don't owe me anything. You don't have to be here. Wah!" Nico gave a shocked yelp when Percy picked him up again and tossed him over his shoulder the way a fireman would carry someone.

"Idiot. I'm here because we're friends."

"That's not what you just said! You said you owed me, but you don't."

"Well let's put it this way," said Percy. "I owe it to you as your friend to be here. I know if I was in trouble, you'd be there for me. Wouldn't you?"

"Yeah, but . . . but . . . can we stop at McDonalds on the way to where Thoth is?"

"What's that about ADHD?" muttered Sadie.

"Shut up you freaking Brit harpy!"

"Hey!"

"Nico," said Percy, setting his cousin down for a second. "Let's try to get along with these guys, for now at least."

"So who's Bianca?" asked Sadie snidely. "Your ex-girlfriend? Did Percy steal her? Is that why he-"

_"STA ZITTA! _SHUT UP!"

Nico's eyes flared red fresh blood as he spun on Sadie.

Carter grabbed his sister's arm and pulled her back away from the enraged demigodling. "Now would be a good time to shut up, Sadie," he advised.

"You don't know what you're talking about! So shut up! Unless you want one of the corpses in this graveyard to clear out of his coffin and make room for you!" Nico screamed.

"Nico, stop!" Percy was much braver than Carter would have thought anyone could be. He grabbed Nico to stop him from advancing toward Sadie, disregarding the kid's glowing red eyes and the shadows that swirled around him like tar black ghosts. "We have bigger things to worry about than a stupid girl who doesn't know what she's talking about. Your dad's going to start a war, remember? We've only got three days to stop it."

"Less than that now," said Carter quickly. "It was three days when Bast was at the First Nome. Now it's more like two and a third days or something like that."

"Nico, come on!" Percy put himself directly in front of Nico, blocking his view of the Kanes. "Snap out of it. You don't have the energy to be doing that right now."

Nico's eyes must have stopped glowing because the red light Percy was blocking dimmed and faded from behind his silhouette profile. "What? Huh? Percy? Are we at McDonalds yet?"

"Not yet, little cousin," said Percy. "We've still got a ways to go. Can you still hang on if I carry you on my back?"

"Uh, yeah . . ."

Carter was amazed that the whole incident was put behind them that quickly. Only moments later they were walking again, just as they'd been before. Nico put his head back against Percy's shoulder and appeared to go to sleep, but he'd looked like he was sleeping last time, so they couldn't really be sure.

"By the way," said Percy very softly. "If you value your health, never mention her again."

He didn't say who "her" was, but he didn't have to. Whoever this Bianca was, she'd sure done a number on Nico.

* * *

The rest of the trip to the Pyramid Arena where Thoth had taken up residence went without incident, and if Carter had any gods that he prayed to he would have been thanking them. Nico slept the entire way there, except to inhale the three Happy Meals that they picked up for him at an all night McDonalds drive-thru, then he fell right back to sleep. Carter had the presence of mind to remember how many baboons had been around Thoth at the university last time they were there, and warned Percy, who decided it would probably be best if he carried his cousin into the pyramid, and let him sleep as long as they could. Not that there was a whole lot of chance that the baboons would be having a game of pick up at two in the morning, but it was better not to take chances. So Nico got another piggy-back ride, through the halls of the deserted pyramid shaded sports arena, and Bast decided to take care of the car since she still had issues with Thoth. The magicians and demigods made good time since there were no distractions and before long they were in front of an office door with a gleaming gold name plate on the door, proclaiming it to be the office of Coach Thoth. Even in the hallway, Carter could smell a barbeque going.

They knocked before entering this time, and went in to find Thoth measuring BBQ sauce into a beaker while blues music played from a phonograph that was probably older than all four of the teens/preteens combined. Thoth looked up as they came in and gave them one of his odd smiles.

"Ah, if it isn't the Kanes. And without Isis and Horus this time. And the son of Poseidon himself! But who's that on your back? Oh my . . . it couldn't be . . . Anubis?" Thoth came toward them looking exactly as he had the last time they'd been there. He still had the same tangled blond hair, faded jeans, and lab coat with BBQ stains on it, which gave him the appearance of a mad-hippie-scientist.

"Mmm . . ." Nico's eyes fluttered and then opened as though he subconsciously realized people were talking about him. "What's going on?"

"Most unusual, most unusual!" Thoth looked at him delightedly. "You have succeeded in taking a demigod host! How on earth did you manage such a thing? I would very much like to know. If I could, perhaps, take a son of Athena as a host-"

"I don't recommend that," Percy said warningly, stepping backward, away from Thoth, to keep distance between the eccentric professor and his cousin.

"One demigodling is causing enough problems as it is, Jahooty," said Sadie. "Hades is going to start a war with either the House of Life or the Egyptian pantheon if we don't figure out a way to fix this."

"Fix?" Thoth looked confused.

"I'll show you." All eyes turned to Nico, or actually to Anubis, since that's who seemed to be in charge of the body they shared at that moment. Percy set him down and Anubis stepped forward, holding one of Nico's pale hands out toward Thoth. His fingertips started to glow, but Thoth didn't make any movement to step away, even when Anubis touched the other god's forehead with his glowing hand.

Thoth's eyes widened. "Oh. I see. Well, this certainly is a problem."

Anubis stepped back and blinked several times. Then he backed up several steps, to stand right next to Percy, and Carter guessed that it was probably Nico in control again. "Well?" asked Nico. "Do you know anything about this?"

"As a matter of fact, I do," said Thoth. "You were smart to come to me, Anubis. I might be the only being in existence capable of helping you through this, as I am in possession of the only complete surviving copy of the Prophecies of Cassandra."

Nico's face darkened. "The Mad Oracle?" he asked incredulously. Or perhaps it was Anubis who asked. Carter didn't know and was starting to get confused.

"Mad isn't quite the term I would use to describe Cassandra," said Thoth, waggling a finger at the demigodling. "Modern society has come up with quite a few more accurate and politically correct terms such as bonkers, barking, nuts, mental, looney tunes, fangirl, psychotic. I assure you Cassandra was all of these, as well as all their unpolitically correct terms for crazy as well."

"This isn't a joke, Thoth," said Anubis grimly.

"And I am not joking, my boy," responded Thoth. "Though Cassandra was, in every sense of the words, a rabid and ranting bitch, she was still endowed with the gifts of prophecy."

"Would you mind explaining this to the rest of us?" Percy asked. "We're trying to stop the war too, so it would be nice if you brought us up to speed."

"Yes, of course," said Thoth. "But in a moment. There is one thing I would like to try first, a test to see how badly caught in Nico di Angelo's soul Anubis has gotten himself. It might even be that I can detach them here and save us all quite a bit of trouble, as well as a very long lecture filled with synonyms for insane. Anubis, please show me your heart scarab."

Carter watched as Nico/Anubis began taking off his jacket, and noticed that his hands seemed to jerk sporadically. Percy seemed to notice too.

"Nico? Are you okay with this?"

When he answered it was with Anubis' voice. "This is necessary, Percy."

Percy grabbed Nico's wrist. "So in other words, Nico's not okay with it."

Anubis jerked his hand away and stepped back from his host's cousin. "Thoth is the wisest being in existence, and is charged with maintaining order and balance. A war between the House of Hades and the House of Life would be cataclysmic to the balance of our societies. A war between the Greek and Egyptian pantheons would be even worse. If Thoth believes he might have a way to put an end to this here and now, then we would be fools not to let him make the attempt. And if I can't trust him, then I cannot trust anyone." His face twitched suddenly and Nico shone through for a moment and looked disgusted. "I can't believe you're trusting a gods damned _hippie_ with this!"

"Ah, the Cult of the Flower Children, a most fascinating organization," mused Thoth.

"Go to the crows, bird-brain," said Nico.

"I beg your pardon!"

"My host speaking, Lord Thoth," Anubis said quickly, taking control again. "Not me. My apologies."

Percy seemed to hesitate, unsure whether or not he should go against the Egyptian gods to back his cousin's wishes or not.

"We should give Thoth a chance, I think," Carter told him. "Thoth has helped us before." He decided not to mention the questionable methods Thoth had used.

Anubis removed his jacket and pulled off his shirt, at least honoring Nico's wish not to imitate any girls at Mardi Gras.

"Very interesting," said Thoth, stepping closer to Nico. He knelt in front of the boy so that he was at eye level with the scarab and touched it carefully with two fingertips. "It really does have a pulse of its own. It really has replaced your host's heart. What an amazing phenomenon."

"Well?" asked Sadie. "Can you fix them?"

"I must at least make the attempt," said Thoth. He placed his palm over the scarab, covering it completely, and then began to glow with a soft yellow light. Like the light emitted by the Ribbons of Hathor, it looked tranquil, almost holy. And just as he had in the presence of the Ribbons of Hathor, Nico began screaming like his heart was being cut right out of his chest.

"Oh no, not again," moaned Sadie.

"Stop it right now!" screamed Percy, moving to intervene. Thoth had already stopped on his own before Percy pushed him away. Nico crumpled to the floor and curled into a ball like he was trying to protect his heart scarab. Everything in the room was silent except for his painful gasps and sobs.

"That is it!" shouted Percy, kneeling beside his cousin and putting a hand on his shoulder, keeping his own body between Nico and everyone else in the room. "From now on the heart scarab stays covered up. No one else sees it and no one else touches it!"

"I am truly sorry," said Thoth, looking shaken himself. He looked down at Nico with a touch of guilt in his expression. "That was not the result I intended to get."

"Nico? Hey," Percy turned his attention to his cousin. "Nico, can you hear me?"

"Hurts," Nico gasped, curling into a ball even tighter.

Percy gave everyone else in the room a dark look, as though daring them to make fun of his cousin, then picked up Nico's jacket and draped it over him. "It's alright. You're going to be okay."

"Hurts so much . . ."

They gave Nico some time. What else could they do? They were all feeling a little guilty for going along with Anubis and Thoth's plans when Nico obviously objected to them, and now he was the one who was paying the price. It was enough to make anyone feel bad.

Finally, after five full minutes of shaking and whimpering, Nico managed to pull himself together. Percy helped him sit up and get his shirt and jacket back on. Then Nico leaned with his back against the wall looking dazed and drained.

"Are you hungry?" asked Carter, taking note of how tired Nico looked and remembering how hungry he and Sadie had been after using magic when they'd been possessed by Isis and Horus.

"Yeah," muttered Nico. It was his first word to anyone other than his cousin since the incident.

"Are there any vending machines in this building?" asked Carter, fishing into his own pockets for change.

"No need for that," said Thoth, sounding very cheerful all of a sudden. "I have some barbeque prepared! Let's see . . ."

It was the oddest impromptu picnic Carter had ever been to, not that he'd been to many picnics. But he was fairly sure that normal picnics didn't involve eating brisket out of petrie dishes, adding extra sauce from beakers, drinking lemonade out of flasks, or having the food heated by Bunsen burners.

"So now what?" asked Nico, reviving after eating some of Thoth's barbeque, and drinking an entire flask of lemonade. "Did you learn anything useful while you were flaying my artificial heart, or was that a complete waste of time?"

"Well," said Thoth, "The news isn't very good. What I discovered was that your soul and Anubis' are not merely tangled, as I had assumed, and as he had hoped. They are actually fused together and can't be separated by any natural means."

"Of course not. That would be too easy," muttered Nico.

"Yes. But in the pursuit of knowledge many doors are opened that-"

"Save it," snapped Nico. "I don't care about wisdom and all that garbage. That's how I got on the Athena cabin's bad side, but that's another story. So why don't you just tell us about that Crazy Cassandra or whatever you said her name was. Anubis seemed to think that whatever she said would be a waste of time, but he's a freaking idiot, so I'm all for hearing about it."

"Yes, yes . . ." Thoth wiped sauce from his mouth with what looked like a piece of filter paper. "More lemonade?"

Carter would have sworn that Nico's eyes flared red like they had in the cemetery, but only for a second.

"I want to hear about Cassandra."

"Yes, and I'll tell you about her, young demigod, but you should eat more. You'll need the energy."

Nico accepted another flask of lemonade and took a drink. He made a face. "Bitter," he muttered, but took another drink.

"Alright. Cassandra," said Thoth. He produced a clip board from somewhere and began thumbing through the papers on it. "Let's see . . . shopping list . . . thesis on the origins of jazz . . . SparkNotes for Twilight . . . ah ha! The prophecies of the Mad Oracle!" He unclipped a piece of ancient looking papyrus and waved it around like a banner.

"Get to the point already."

Thoth cleared his throat. "Well, to start, do you demigods know who Cassandra was?"

"The prophetess from the Iliad?" asked Percy.

"Yes and no," said Thoth. "Homer, you see, was somewhat inaccurate in his portrayal of her. Greek myths in general tend to have her back-story wrong. They say that she was a human gifted with prophecy by Apollo, but who spurned his love and was cursed to never have her visions believed. Though I'm sure the two of you know that Apollo's oracles are required to be chaste, thus Apollo himself wouldn't be messing around with them."

"So what's the real story?" Nico wanted to know.

"The real story is that she was a mortal woman who could see through the Mist," said Thoth. "And she did take into her the spirit of the Oracle of Delphi and became a prophetess of Apollo. Foresight into the future can be a very powerful thing. It can be a gift-"

"A gift or a curse, blah, blah, blah," Nico interrupted. "Yes, we know. Tell us why this is important."

Thoth looked like he would have been offended if it had been anyone else who'd interrupted him so rudely. But perhaps because he thought it might be Anubis and was used to Anubis' bad moods, or perhaps because he felt bad about what he'd did to Nico, he let it go.

"After getting a taste of power, Cassandra wanted more," continued Thoth. "She was a smart girl. Ambitious, perhaps power-hungry. Or perhaps she simply wanted to put herself on a level closer to those who she was always around. Even with the spirit of the Oracle, she was still merely a mortal. Surrounded by demigods who came to seek her prophecies, she realized how lacking she was in real power and she wanted to change that.

"Your myths say that Cassandra was the daughter of the King of Troy. This is true. However, what your legends fail to mention is that Cassandra was descended from Egyptian royalty on her mother's side."

"She had the blood of the pharaohs then," Carter realized.

Thoth nodded. "And can you guess what she did to obtain more power?"

"She tried to get herself possessed by one of the Egyptian gods, as well as by that oracle thingy," said Sadie.

"What a stupid freak," muttered Nico darkly.

"Her powers of prophecy gave her no warning as to what would happen when she became a godling as well as an oracle, because the magic of the Greek and Egyptian pantheons does not and cannot mix," said Thoth. "Both have similarities, yes. Elemental powers, shape-shifting, and prophecies, but the energies that they use are completely different. The Greek Oracles do not have visions of the problems of the Egyptians because they are not on the same wavelength, in a matter of speaking. The reverse is true of the Egyptian diviners as well. Think of it as AM and FM radiowaves. The Oracles aren't attuned to the Egyptian channels, and the Diviners aren't attuned to the Greek channels, leaving both pantheons blind where mystical attempts to spy on the other is concerned."

"So what happened?" asked Percy. "Did the possession thing fail?"

"It did not."

"But you said–"

"The AM/FM analogy is for the fortune telling abilities only," said Thoth. "The actual divine powers themselves are more like AC and DC currents of electricity."

"I don't know what that means," said Nico, looking annoyed.

"Two different types of electricity," Percy tried to explain.

"There's more than one type of electricity? Since when?" demanded Nico.

"Uh, I don't know. I don't really think it's important right now, but . . . it might have something to do with magnetism . . . or something." Percy looked a bit lost. "Anyway, that's not the point. Just accept that there are two different types of electricity and most electrical stuff can only use one type of electricity or the other . . . at least I think that's how it works."

"Okay," accepted Nico, "But what happens when you use the wrong kind of electricity on an appliance?"

"If you're lucky, it just won't work," said Percy. "If you're not lucky and your device is faulty or the wiring is shoddy, it could explode."

"So the hippie's telling me that I'm going to explode."

"No . . . maybe . . ." Percy looked quickly to Thoth. "He's not going to . . ."

"We were discussing Cassandra, if you recall," said Thoth, looking humored by the situation. "Your cousin's situation is unique. Let us review the knowledge that the past has provided us before we begin making predictions about whether or not Anubis' host will explode. More lemonade, Nico?"

"Is it going to keep me from exploding?" Nico wanted to know.

"No evidence suggests that it would."

"Then no," snapped Nico. "It's too bitter."

"You mean sour," said Sadie.

"No, I mean bitter. Like chocolate with no sugar at all. Not like Sour Patch Kids, which are delicious and full of artificial colors and flavors."

"So what happened to Cassandra?" asked Carter, hoping to get them all back on track again. "Did she really manage to become a host for one of the gods?"

Thoth nodded. "She did. A very minor Egyptian goddess known as Hetepet, who had a small cult devoted to her."

"And did she explode?" asked Nico.

"Can we get away from the whole idea of exploding?" asked Thoth.

"Hey, if you thought you might explode, you'd probably want to find out more about it too!"

"Your cousin's exploding example was just an analogy!"

"You're an analogy."

"Do you even know what an analogy is, demigod?"

Nico shrugged. "No."

Thoth covered his eyes and shook his head. "The worst thing about you demigods is your lack of education. Allowing your so-called dyslexia to prevent you from gaining knowledge-"

"Every bit of knowledge that I once had got washed away by the River Lethe at my own father's orders," said Nico bitterly. "So I'm sorry for the inconvenience, but I've only had a few years to start building it back up again."

"Your own father had you mind-wiped?" asked Carter horrified.

Nico shrugged again. "Daddy issues, remember? So what happened to Cassandra?"

"She went completely insane," said Thoth.

"Am I going to-"

"We don't know if you're going to go insane or not, demigod. Never before in history has there been an instance where an Egyptian god succeeded in taking a demigod as his host, and believe me, many, many of our gods have tried. When things were at their most desperate in our struggle with the House of Life we almost started a war with the Greek gods who were quite miffed that we were snatching their children. That would have been catastrophic.

"But until today, I did not believe it even possible for a demigod to host an Egyptian god," said Thoth. "If I had known it was possible, I would have intervened sooner when our pantheon was making so many attempts at it. The result when Cassandra, an Oracle, succeeded in hosting a god as well, was horrible. Her visions became corrupted. Her powers began tearing her fragile human mind apart. At the best of times, the Spirit of Delphi is stressful. The Egyptian Goddess' power magnified that and she lost all reason. She went completely mad and began prophecizing doom and calamity every single day. She seemed to know when every human she saw would meet their end, and she made it a point to tell them. Those with the worst fates she specifically sought out, as though to torment them with the knowledge of their demise. So naturally, people began to disregard her prophecies. It was difficult for a man to take her seriously when she informed him that he would meet his end when a boat anchor hit him in the back, sunk into his skin to hook behind his spine, and jerked his vertebrae out through his back when the ship set sail."

Nico and Percy exchanged glances. Percy's expression was unreadable. Nico's was a little too amused. "And I thought Rachel was bad."

Percy frowned at that. "Rachel's not-"

"Kidding, Percy, kidding."

"Before Cassandra's parents had her interred in Troy, she made a prophecy about the End of Days to the Cult of Hetepet in Lower Egypt. It foretold the end of the world with the appearance of a dark champion with a stone scarab for a heart."

"And you say you have a copy of the prophecy?" asked Carter.

Thoth nodded and held the sheet of papyrus aloft again. "The Mad Oracle made many prophecies of doom and destruction, and despite her being obviously insane, her visions themselves were true. Such as the one about the mushroom cloud of doom. Quite a few people thought that one was referring to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland when it was first published, which caused quite a panic amongst the cult in Victorian England. And then that dreadful portent about-

"I don't care!" Nico bit out angrily. "Just read the prophecy about the stone scarab!"

Thoth sighed and began to read.

_"Born of the Evil Day and the River of Life,_

_ And of He Who Unlocks Death and a Daughter of Rome_

_ Are the Death God of Desecration and Strife_

_ And the Ba King who rises in the Twenty-First Nome._

_ Death and Death's Son, fused at the soul_

_ With a stone scarab for a heart_

_ In one body are whole._

_ When balance and order are sundered apart_

_ And chaos and disorder eternally reign_

_ When hope is lost and the gods' temples are razed_

_ A dark champion shall put an end to the pain_

_ By giving rise to the End of Days."_

The magicians and the demigods were silent for several moments after Thoth finished reading.

"That's some depressing stuff," said Sadie at last.

"No kidding," grumbled Nico. "I'm starting to think exploding might be an okay option after all."

"So . . . the way that prophecy sounds to me . . ." said Percy hesitantly, "Is like this person with a stone scarab for a heart, presumably the dark champion, is going to . . . well . . ."

"Destroy the world." Nico's voice sounded dead. He pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them looking miserable.

"But it doesn't sound like this person would do it maliciously," Percy said quickly. "It sounds more like . . ."

"Like mercy killing," said Sadie. "Like everything is over and the bad guys win. And this dark champion decides that the only way to stop people from suffering is to end it all . . ."

"Hetepet's Cult must have been made up of a bunch of gods damned wing nuts," said Nico venomously. "They cut out their deads' hearts and replaced them with stone scarabs to try to jump start this prophecy? Hoping their dead Aunt Cleo would end up becoming this dark champion when she was a ba, and ending the world? What in Hades was wrong with them!"

"You know this prophecy isn't necessarily about you, Nico," said Percy.

Nico fixed him with a look that would have made most people flinch.

"It doesn't have to be," Percy insisted. "I mean, remember the last Great Prophecy when we all thought I was going to have my soul reaped? These things are always more ambiguous than you think."

"I don't know about that, Percy," said Nico. "This time it seems pretty clear."

"How so? I mean, even in the first line, that stuff about an evil day and a river of life? That doesn't even make sense."

"I'm afraid it does," said Carter. He looked at Sadie who nodded, agreeing that he should tell them. "Evil Day is Set, Anubis' father. That's his true name. I don't know how happy he'd be to learn Cassandra wrote it down in a prophecy, but that's not the point. It definitely has to be him, because his wife was Nephythys, a river goddess. The River of Life."

"And He Who Unlocks Death," said Nico. "That's definitely my father. His keys lock and unlock death, as does his sword. I know you remember how much trouble that caused. You almost lost all your memories in the Lethe during that fiasco."

"But the Daughter of Rome –"

"Obviously my mother. You were there when Hades said it. Her father was an Italian diplomat and she was a native of Venice. Italy was always the heart of the Roman Empire . . . come to think of it . . ." Nico's expression suddenly changed drastically. He looked very, very upset.

"What's wrong?" asked Sadie.

"This means I'm not an American!" said Nico. "All this time, I thought I was, but I'm not! I'm _Italian!_ This is _awful!"_

Everyone stared at him. "What?" Percy finally asked.

"I was proud to be a citizen of the nation that created McDonalds, but it was all a lie!"

"Are you feeling alright, Nico?" Percy wanted to know.

"No! How can I? After learning this?"

"Right . . ." Percy gave him a sideways looks. "Let's take another look at the prophecy."

"The God of Desecration and Strife must be Anubis," said Carter. "Nico himself called him the god of corpse desecration. I don't understand the thing about the Ba King though, but the Twenty-First Nome is New York."

"What's a ba?" Percy wanted to know.

"A kind of spirit," muttered Nico. He gave Percy an ironic smile. "A ghost."

"Oh. Right. Yeah, that sounds a lot like Nico . . ."

"Ghost King . . . Ba King . . ." Nico shook his head in disgust. "Why can't I be the Zombie King? Or the Lich King? He's got 4500 special attack."

"The line about Death and Death's Son being fused at the soul fits as well," said Thoth. "And you both now inhabit one body, and you have a stone scarab for a heart. Every one of the indicators fits."

"But that doesn't mean that it has to be him," Percy insisted.

"How many other people do you know with a rock for a heart?" asked Sadie.

Percy shook his head. "None, but that doesn't mean it has to be Nico. There are ways to cheat prophecies, or at least postpone them. The last Great Prophecy was delayed for over sixty years because Hades kept his kids from turning 16, the age that the child in the prophecy had to reach. Then Thalia dodged the arrow as well by getting turned into a tree for a few years, then she sidestepped it by joining the Hunters, so that she wouldn't ever reach her sixteenth birthday."

"But age is about the easiest thing for the Greek gods to cheat," said Thoth. "The markers in this prophecy are very specific. Can you think of any other person, living or dead, who even matches one of them?"

Percy glared at Thoth. "It still doesn't mean it has to be Nico. He might live a long life and die of old age in his sleep, and then someone else could come along who fits the bill even better than him."

"Do you honestly believe that, demigod?"

Percy remained defiant and nodded. "Of course I do. I refuse to believe there's no way to save my cousin from this."

"Such loyalty to distant relatives is very rare for demigods," noted Thoth.

"We've been through a lot together," said Percy flatly. "So now we watch out for each other."

"Thank you, Percy," said Nico very, very softly. Carter had never heard him sound so sincere before.

"Yes, yes, this show of kinship is quite touching, but the problem still remains," said Thoth. "Right now I see before us three options."

"Let's hear them," said Carter.

"The first, we do nothing and allow destiny to take its course-"

"Not an option," said Percy.

"The second, is that we lock Nico in the Duat for eternity, banishing him from this realm forever after finding his true name so we know for certain it will be permanent."

"That's definitely not an option!" Percy almost shouted.

"I think it's a poor choice as well," said Thoth. "If he disappears then Hades will blame the House of Life. A war will start which could cause the prophecy to be fulfilled even in Nico's absence, if he somehow found a way to destroy the world from whatever plane he was cast into."

"Wh-what?" asked Nico. His voice sounded odd, but Carter figured that some slack had to be given to him, all things considered.

"What's the third option that you see?" asked Percy. "And this better be a good one or we're leaving."

"The third option is that we move Nico's soul into the Duat temporarily, in his ba or spirit walking form, and see if any way to unfuse his soul from Anubis' presents itself," explained Thoth.

"Didn't you already say that it can't be undone?" asked Percy skeptically. "The last time you tried-"

"Had adverse effects on his physical body, mainly because it got in the way. In the Duat, or the spirit world, that would not be an obstacle."

Percy turned to Nico. "What do you think?"

"I . . . uh . . ." Nico touched one hand to his head.

"This is a lot to take in, I know," said Percy, "but it might be the best option for now."

"I agree," said Thoth, "which is why I have already taken measures to help separate Nico's soul from his body."

"Wait, what?" shouted Percy, turning back to Nico just in time to see Nico slump to the floor, out cold.

* * *

. . . I'm so mean to Nico, it actually makes me feel kind of bad. But not bad enough to alter my plans. There's plenty more suffering in store for him in this story, and from the way things are looking right now, he's not going to have an easy time of it in future stories in this AU either . . .

Which brings me to the announcement about this story I was planning on making. Originally I was only planning for this to be a one story AU, but as I went along, I started having too much fun to end it so quickly, and I started having more and more ideas for things that could happen in the universe. So, I've decided I'll be carrying on with it, even after I finish this story, which means that not everything will be wrapped up all nice and neat and resolved. Hopefully, it'll be kind of like the real books, with a satisfying ending to each novel, but ending with the knowledge that there will be more to follow, and loose ends will be used as plot threads in future stories . . . and that just sounded incredibly arrogant, comparing my fics to the original masterpieces, but that's not how I meant it to sound.

So, this fic will revolve around averting (or at least attempting to avert) a war between Hades and one or both of the Egyptian parties be might be declaring war on. And even though this is an AU, I'm going to try not to deviate from Mr. Riordan's main stories too much, so what I write will be occurring between his books instead of trying to crudely replace what he'll be writing in the future. So that means things between Sadie and Anubis will be moving long kind of slow (sorry to everyone who's a Sadie/Anubis shipper) and Zia won't be showing up until after Sadie and Carter find her in the real books (though they might have some misadventures with Percy, Nico, and possibly some other demigods while trying to find her between the real books.)

As always, I'd love to hear what you think, about this chapter or my plans for the AU, so please review, even if it's just to tell me to stop being such a sadistic witch to Nico, or to deflate my head and stop comparing my fics to real books. It made me so happy to come home from vacation and find that I had exactly 100 reviews!

Next chapter: Nico's on an acid trip, and the House of Life attacks again!


	8. Chapter 8

I'm not really sure what some of the people who reviewed last chapter were going on about. I'm well aware that the Memphis University is not close to the Pyramid Arena, and I never made any claim that it was. I'm aware that it's no longer used as a sports arena, as is Rick Riordan, since he writes as much when he has Thoth announce his intent to move in. If you've got a problem with Thoth being in the pyramid instead of the university then I think you need to reread Chapter 25. This fic takes place about 3 months after the end of the Red Pyramid, which has given Thoth plenty of time to set up shop in his new dream home, add the big lab he was threatening to, as well as an office, a kitchen, music studio, birdbath, Elvis shrine, and whatever the heck else a bird-headed hippie god of wisdom feels like adding. And beings as the building's official name is The Pyramid Arena, adding to the fact that years ago I saw the most awesome boxing match of my life there, as well as the fact that they _haven't _turned it into anything else since they stopped using it for sports events, no matter what they've considered doing with it, the term 'arena' fits.

* * *

8

"What did you do!" Percy had Riptide out and was ready to see if Celestial Bronze worked on Egyptian gods.

"I assure you, he's perfectly fine," said Thoth. "I merely slipped a little something extra into his lemonade to help assist him in spirit walking."

"What?" demanded Percy. "What did you drug him with?"

"Merely a bit of lysergic acid diethylamide," said Thoth. "More commonly known by its acronym, LSD."

Percy's jaw dropped. He looked down at Nico, who appeared to be in a deep sleep, then back at Thoth and thought about testing out the Celestial Bronze again. "You gave my cousin _acid_? What in Hades is wrong with you? He's _twelve-years_-old for the gods' sake!"

"Exactly. The mental acuity needed to consciously will your spirit out of your body is far beyond his grasp. The LSD will aid him with that. He has probably already made it to the Duat, even as we speak, so if you'll excuse me . . ." Then Thoth disappeared. One second he was there, the next he wasn't. There was no fade out or flickering like in the movies and no time for Percy to react and cut off the stupid hippie's head.

"Damn it!" Percy shouted and kicked a desk. It fell over with a monumental crash, but Nico didn't even stir. He returned to his cousin's side and knelt down beside him, checking to make sure he was still breathing and that he still had a pulse.

"Well," said Sadie.

"Shut up," Percy told her.

"Sorry."

"I don't want to hear it." Percy shifted so that he sat beside Nico and crossed his arms, trying to think. The harder he tried to fix things the more messed up they seemed to get. It was hard to believe that only a week ago his biggest worry was passing English. Now he had to figure out a way to help his cousin cheat a prophecy in which he was supposed to destroy the world. _We're really in a mess this time, Nico,_ he thought at his cousin, _But I'll get you through it. I promise._ And again he had to wonder if his cousin had some sort of telepathy, because at that moment Nico leaned against him in his sleep, his head coming to rest on Percy's shoulder.

Sadie snickered and Percy glared at her. "What?" he asked sharply.

"I was just thinking that from this angle, you two look like brothers," said Sadie. "You've both got dark hair and Caucasian features. But because of that Greek god DNA-less thing, you say you're really not related. While Carter and I don't look a thing alike, even though we're related by blood and have the exact same parents."

Percy shrugged the shoulder that Nico wasn't resting his head against. "Family is family." The words were out of his mouth before he even had time to consider them, but once he did he realized that he really did believe them. Even though family was such a sketchy concept to demigods, Percy wanted to protect what little he had. Or what little he could claim. His mother, of course, and Tyson, the only one of his hundreds of half brothers who he really acknowledged, or in return acknowledged him. His father too, though Poseidon didn't really need his protection. And his stepfather, Paul Blofis, who was becoming the father he always wished he had growing up. And now, Nico . . . The only one of his thousands of cousins and extended relatives who he acknowledged, and in return acknowledged him. He'd still be protecting the kid if they were just friends, and not invoking the family bond that pretty much made it his gods given right to stand beside Nico and help him however he needed it in the normal world. Loyalty was still his fatal flaw, after all. But somehow invoking that family bond made things different in a way Percy couldn't really explain. It made him and Nico closer than mere friends, even if they were best friends, like Percy and Grover were. It made Percy wonder if this was what it was like to have a normal family, with normal cousins.

"You know when I first met you, I thought you were a psychopath with a pegasus," confessed Sadie, interrupting Percy's musings "but you're actually okay."

"When I first met you guys, I was planning on cracking your skulls open if you'd hurt my cousin," said Percy. "It's a good thing you didn't hurt my cousin."  
"Enough, Sadie," said Carter when Sadie scowled and opened her mouth to say something that was probably rude.

Then Percy heard something. Footsteps in the hallway. Someone was running toward them. Deciding that it was better to be safe than sorry, Percy gently moved Nico so that he could stand up, and moved toward the door, Riptide at the ready.

"What's wrong?" Carter asked, then he must have heard the footsteps too, because he pulled his sword out of thin air. Sadie produced her staff as well and spun it around several times before setting into a stance and pointing it at the door.

Then the door burst open and Bast rushed in. "Trouble," she told them, "Our friends from the House of Life are on their way. Where's Thoth?"

"That stupid hippie drugged my cousin with acid to send him into the spirit world, then went there himself," growled Percy.

"That's not good." Bast looked anxiously back at the hallway. "There's too many of them. The Memphis Nome has either called for reinforcements or increased in number since the last time we were here. Probably the latter, since this city's so filled with homage for Egyptian culture, and since they know Thoth's here."

"Great. Really nice time for Jahooty to send Death Boy on an acid trip," said Sadie. "So now what do we do?"

Percy hauled Nico off the ground and picked him up, shifting him over his shoulder in a fireman's carry. "We get the heck out of here."

* * *

Everything was fuzzy, but Nico could tell that he wasn't on earth anymore. He wasn't in Hades either. That only left one place that he knew of.

"Anubis?" he called, as he blinked several times quickly and shook his head, hoping that would clear his thoughts.

"Welcome back," said the familiar voice that he'd grown used to hearing inside his head. Only now it wasn't in his head. Anubis stood in front of him in his teenage guise, dressed in all black as usual.

"Where am I?"  
"The Hall of Judgment," Anubis told him. "Thoth wanted to see if unfusing our souls here would be possible."

Nico kept blinking because things were still blurry. "And is it?"

"He's still doing some calculations."

Nico rubbed his eyes and finally everything became clear. He could see the infamous scales that he'd researched, where the human heart was weighed against a feather of truth. And curled up beneath them like a cat was . . .

"That can't be the Ammit, can it?" Nico asked, pointing at the poodle-sized creature.

"It is. The creature that strikes fear into the heart of every Egyptian, living or dead," Anubis answered in an ominous tone.

"Cerberus could so squash that little runt," sneered Nico.

Anubis gave him an unhappy look. "Ammit is big enough to do his job."

"His job? I thought the legends said the Ammit was a girl," said Nico.

"The legends got it wrong," returned Anubis. "Just like Mythomagic. Only giving Ammit 2800 attack power . . ."

"Well at least they got it right that the Cerberus card completely pwns Ammit," said Nico.

Anubis glared at him. "Someday we will have to settle this, man to man, Nico."

"Card to card," Nico agreed. "Hope you're ready to lose."

Right then Ammit, who'd been sleeping curled up like a cat, woke up and looked around. He spotted Nico and Anubis and jumped up and bounded toward them.

"Ammit, heel!" ordered Anubis, but Ammit didn't heel. He loped right over to Nico and leapt at him, knocking him backward.

Something broke Nico's fall but sent minor jolts of pain racing through his back. Or not really his back, but he didn't know how else to describe it. There was a sound like feathers rustling, but he grew distracted because Ammit was licking his face.

"No, Ammit! Bad boy!" Anubis hurried and picked the creature up, getting it off of Nico. "Sorry about that."

"It's fine," muttered Nico. "Hellhounds usually knock me down and start jumping on my chest. You have no idea how many ribs I've cracked that way." He braced his hands against the floor to push himself up, but his fingers touched something soft that confused him. He turned his head to the side and saw black feathers. Lots of black feathers. "Huh? What's this?" he asked.

"Oh? You didn't notice?" asked Anubis, petting Ammit's head affectionately. "You have wings."

"I have wings?" Nico sat up without the aid of his hands. Sure enough, out the corners of his eyes he could see them now. Black feathered wings stretched out of his back, like a crow's or a fallen angel's. "How?" he demanded.

"I'm not positive," said Anubis.

"Did I have them last time I was here?"

"You did not."

"Why do I have them now then?"

Anubis shrugged. "Most ba are in a form like a bird with their human head. Those are, I suppose you could call it, the default settings for spirits in the Duat. You don't exactly belong here, but I suppose now that our souls are fused you belong here now more than last time, so your form has adapted."

"Maybe," muttered Nico. "When demigods spirit walk, we look like we do when we're human, except mostly transparent. I guess to most people and demigods we're completely transparent. No other demigod that I know of can see spirit walkers when they're present. I assume that's because of who my dad is. Spirit walkers are almost the same thing as ghosts after all."

"Perhaps," said Anubis. "But whatever the reason, you have wings now."

"I won't still have them when I go back, will I?" demanded Nico. "Because even though flying is fun, it'll be damned inconvenient trying to get on the subway, or lay down on a sofa. And if I fly too high then Zeus is going to smite me. Oh, and my dad will definitely know something's up if I suddenly have wings."

"You should not have them when you return," said Anubis.

"How did I even get here in the first place?"

"Thoth put a little something extra in your drink."

"Gods damned hippie," muttered Nico. "How long is this going to take, anyway?"

"Time passes differently between this world and yours," said Anubis. "I cannot accurately predict how much time will have passed before you return. It could be seconds or minutes. It shouldn't be more than a day this time."

"A day?" spluttered Nico. "We're on a time limit, remember?"

"We also have that prophecy to consider, remember?"

"Of course I remember! It's kind of hard to forget a prophecy where you're the one who's supposed to cause the apocalypse!" shouted Nico. "But have you considered that failing to stop my dad from starting a war with someone will probably be the first step to making that prophecy come true? If we stop him from blowing up the House of Life or trying to take out your entire pantheon, we'll probably at least delay the end of the world."

"Bad news," said Thoth, suddenly appearing right between Nico and Anubis.

"Ah!" Nico jumped back in shocked and fumbled to get his switchblade out of his pocket.

"I can see no way to separate your souls," said Thoth. "They seem to blend into each other seamlessly, like pigments mixed in paint. The two of you are literally stuck together."

"So this has all been for nothing," said Nico. "Good to know."

"The pursuit of knowledge is never for nothing!" Thoth sounded quite affronted.

"It is when it wastes my time," growled Nico. "Can I go back now? Percy's probably about to tear up your office because of this."

"Yes, the young man seemed quite angry about the lysergic acid diethylamide." Thoth frowned. "Though oddly, it seems that your physical body is not where it was when you left it. Most odd."

"So they moved me to a chair or into a corner. Big deal."

"No, no. You're more than a hundred yards away," said Thoth.

"Well then Percy probably wanted to keep me away from you," said Nico. "Drugging people is usually considered both rude and illegal, so you should be able to understand why he's pissed off."

"Yes, yes." Thoth sounded distracted and probably hadn't really heard what Nico said. "Well, I suppose I've learned all that I can for now, so I might as well send you back. Do come back and visit though. You're the most interesting thing I've stumbled across since blues music. Come back for another barbeque sometimes." With that, he pointed a wand shaped like an ankh at Nico and some hieroglyphics glowed in the air around him. The next thing Nico knew he was being catapulted through time and space, back into his body.

* * *

Percy, the Kanes, and Bast made it out of the pyramid and into the parking-lot, but then their luck ran out. A dozen House of Life magicians blocked their path to the car which Bast had left running.

"Not good," said Sadie.

Percy made a tactical decision. "Keep running!" he ordered. Keeping Nico safe right now was his top priority, and getting away was the surest way to do that.

The magicians gave chase, so Percy headed for the river.

"Wait!" called Sadie. "We can't shake them that way!"

"Yes we can!" Percy shouted back to her.

The Mississippi River was peaceful that night, which meant Percy wouldn't have to fight against a rough current for control, which was good. He would have preferred if it was saltwater, but he couldn't have everything.

"I hope you have a plan," huffed Carter as they reached the river bank.

"I do," said Percy. He held up his hand and concentrated, calling out to the water. A path opened in the water, just wide enough for two people to walk side by side through. It was just like he'd done in the River Lethe back when Hades' sword had been stolen last year, only much, much easier since the river wasn't supernatural and trying to fight him, and since he didn't have a wound caused by a spirit of pestilence slowly poisoning him.

But there was one draw back this time. The Mississippi River was much wider than the Lethe had been. Percy was only able to stretch his path about a quarter of the way across. He'd have to get closer to the end of his pathway before he would be able to stretch it further.

"Nice trick," said Sadie, hurrying to take the lead. Carter and Bast ran right after her. Percy followed them and tried to close the path behind him so that the House of Life freaks couldn't follow, but somehow the water fought his control. He pushed harder with his power but when that didn't work, he turned to see what was wrong.

Then he realized. One of the House of Life magicians had frozen the water, changing it into ice.

"Crap," muttered Percy as the sides of his pathway began to freeze so that he couldn't cut it off anywhere along the line. The ice extended all the way to the end and cut off their escape, turning it into an icy dead end.

"Uh, we might have a problem here," said Sadie.

"Can you control ice?" asked Carter.

"I've never tried," Percy admitted, even though he was trying at that very moment, willing the ice to unthaw and turn back into water. He might as well have been willing pigs to fly for all the good it was doing. "It's not working."

"Another question, then," said Carter. "Can everyone here swim?"

"Of course," said Percy, wondering what kind of question that was. He was the son of the sea god.

"Sadie?"

"Well enough."

Bast made a hissing sound. "I hate swimming."

"We don't have much of a choice right now," said Carter. He pointed his sword at the magicians who were following them into the icy path, then veered its aim to the side so it was pointing at the wall beside and a few steps behind them. "Ha-di!"

Ice cracked and gave way, then water began rushing in. Percy took control of it with his powers and sent it crashing down on top of their enemies. If the House of Life freaks felt like freezing it again, they'd have to freeze it over themselves.

"Now in front of us!" Percy ordered.

Carter obeyed. "Ha-di!" he shouted again, pointing at the ice wall blocking their path. It cracked and fell apart and Percy parted the water beyond it, creating a new path.

"No you don't!" shouted one of the magicians. A forest of reeds sprouted out of the riverbed, blocking their way. Within mere seconds the reeds were five feet high.

"We don't have time for this!" growled Percy. He surged forward to help Carter hack down the reeds, but was hampered by having to balance his cousin over one shoulder.

"Mmmm . . . wha?" Nico's sleepy voice could barely be heard over the hacking of reeds. "Huh? Ah!"

"Great, Death Boy's awake," said Sadie. "Just to fill you in, we're running for our lives from our House of Life friends. Nice of you to join us."

"We're . . . escaping?" asked Nico.

"We're trying," Percy told him.

"Stop right there!" shouted one of their magician enemies. "You can't win! And you can't get away!"

Percy had just started to wonder if maybe the magician was right when Nico said something very, very scary.

"Don't bet on that, crow bait," the son of Hades whispered.

"Nico," said Percy warningly, "Don't. You're under the influence and you're not strong enough-"

He felt Nico grab onto his arm with both hands and the shadows around all of them thickened for the fourth time that night. Darkness reached out to swirl around Bast and the Kanes too, and suddenly they were falling into the black hole of shadow travel.

Their landing this time was the worst one yet. Percy and Nico were flung into a tombstone. Carter ended up on top of a mausoleum, Bast narrowly missed being skewered on an iron cast picket fence, and Sadie was thrown right into a tree.

Percy staggered and only barely managed to avoid dropping Nico on his head. He grabbed onto the tombstone with his free hand and steadied himself, then lowered Nico to the ground. "Hey, you okay, Nico? Nico?"

Nico's face was so pale, he looked like a corpse with freezer burn. His lips were blue and his eyes were open, the pupils dilated the maximum amount they possibly could be.

"Nico!" Percy started to shake his cousin before realizing that probably wasn't the best thing to do. He took out his canteen of nectar and poured about a thimbleful into Nico's mouth, then tilted his head back to make sure it went down his throat. Several moments later Nico started coughing and tried to sit up. "Hey, take it easy," Percy told him, pressing him back to the ground. "Rest a little bit. You're lucky you're not in a coma by now."

"Percy?" asked Nico.

"Yeah, it's me."

"What are all those pretty lights, Percy?" Nico asked, reaching up with one hand and moving it around as though he was trying to capture fireflies that only he could see.

"I'm pretty sure that they're a side effect of your acid trip," Percy told him. Belatedly he wondered if it had been a good idea mixing LSD and nectar, but it was too late to do anything about it now.

"Oh." Nico accepted his answer and let his hand fall to his chest.

"Can someone help me get down from here?" asked Carter from atop the mausoleum.

"Forget you!" shouted Sadie. "Someone help me!"

Getting the Kane siblings back on the ground took some time, but that was alright. It gave Nico a little bit of time to recuperate, which Percy could tell he needed. Anubis showed up in his teenage form to give them a hand and inform them that Nico had shadow traveled them back to Elmwood Cemetery, a pretty amazing feat considering how many times he'd already used that trick that evening, and since he was very obviously stoned.

"I think he probably needs a meal," Anubis said, looking down at Nico who was doing a pretty good impersonation of a corpse. "And some uninterrupted sleep."

"You're right," agreed Percy. "Are there any all night restaurants around here?"

Five minutes later, they were on their way to a nearby pancake house, Percy carrying the drowsy Nico on his back again.

They got to the restaurant with no more mishaps, though the waitress did give them an odd look when they came in the door.

"Isn't it past those kids' bed time?" she asked Bast with a raised eyebrow.

"Does it really matter?" returned Bast. "Or do you not serve pancakes to minors?"

"No need to be cheeky," the waitress said and led them to a booth. She sent a dubious look at Percy and Nico as Percy slid his sleeping cousin off his back and maneuvered him into the booth. "Is he okay?"

"Yeah, he's fine," Percy told her. "Just really tired. It's been a long day."

They ordered and a few minutes later the waitress brought them their drinks. Then they had to wait quite a bit longer for the rest of their food. An awkward silence settled over the table. Percy had no idea how to fill it. Nico was acting like a zombie, and Percy didn't really have much common ground with the magicians or their pet god. So there really wasn't much to talk about.

Thankfully Nico perked up a bit after chugging his cup of black coffee. Percy switched Nico's empty mug with his almost full cup, and after a few swallows Nico blinked owl-like and looked around at the restaurant then at Percy. "Where are we," he asked.

"A pancake house," Percy told him. "It's between two and four in the morning, I think."

"Have we ordered yet?"

"Yes. I ordered for you."

"No health food."

"No." Percy smiled. "I ordered you a stack of chocolate chip pancakes, some fried eggs, and a side of bacon."

Nico gave a tired smile and took another drink of coffee. "Sounds good."

"You feeling alright?"

"Yeah . . . just tired." Nico unconsciously leaned against Percy again, for support.

"The two of you really do seem like brothers," commented Sadie.

Nico gave her a confused look. "Huh?"

"I was telling Percy earlier that you two seem more like siblings than Carter and I do," Sadie told him.

Nico's expression darkened. "Siblings are over-rated. _Family_ is over-rated."

"That's not true," said Carter. "Family can be difficult at times, but it's important. Who else can you count on to be there for you when you really need someone?"

"Just about anyone else," answered Nico.

"You've got Percy here for you now, and I don't think you've ever needed someone to help you more," Sadie reminded him.

"Yeah, but we're not really family," said Nico sounding very irritated.

"Bullocks," Sadie said firmly.

"Can you really sit right there, leaning against your cousin, and claim that you're not real family?" asked Carter.

Nico blinked and looked at Percy, and realized that he was indeed leaning against him. He tried to sit up straight again, and managed to for about two seconds, then his muscles failed him and he slumped against Percy again. Nico started to try once more, and braced himself against the table with both hands, but Percy stopped him with a wave of his hand.

"It's fine, Nico," he told him. "Just rest."

"Sorry, Percy," muttered Nico.

"I just said it's fine. I don't mind," Percy told him. Honestly, he much preferred Nico leaning against him than any other guy. Grover, would have been either drooling or taking bites out of his shirt, and his half brother Tyson would have been really freaking heavy.

"I mean sorry about what I just said," Nico told him. "Those two are right . . . for once."

Sadie scowled while Carter chuckled. Percy couldn't help but give a slight laugh too.

It was then that, finally, their waitress returned to their table with their food. She slid each plate in front of the person who'd ordered it, or in Nico's case, who it had been ordered for, then refilled Nico's and Percy's coffee cups.

The waitress shook her head when Nico immediately drained his cup, despite the fact that it was so hot it was still steaming. "Kids are drinking coffee younger and younger these days." She tapped Percy on the shoulder after she filled it yet again. "You make sure you set a good example for your little brother. It's obvious you have a lot of influence over him."

Sadie and Bast snickered and Carter coughed to try to cover a laugh. Percy glanced sideways at Nico, a little worried about what his reaction would be, but thankfully Nico didn't look mad or upset. He actually looked amused.

"Yeah, Percy, set a good example for me," Nico teased him once the waitress had walked away. "Don't do irresponsible stuff like riding hellhounds or swimming in the Styx, because you know I'm so impressionable and influenced by you."

Percy smirked. "In that case I better call the waitress back here and order us some nice tall glasses of orange juice and some un-sugared grapefruit halves –"

"No! Never mind! Forget it!" Nico grabbed his plate and dug in, glancing warily at Percy every now and again.

Percy laughed and started in on his blueberry pancakes.

* * *

I apologize for taking so long to get this chapter up. I was visiting relatives then immediately after went to basketball camp, and injured my dominant hand there. Or rather my hand was deliberately injured by my biggest rival in a weight room "accident", and I've had to have surgery on it, will need another operation soon, and now my summer plans are in disarray. I love sports. I had a shot a real shot at making the varsity BBall team even though I'm going into my sophomore year, but now I won't be finishing that basketball camp or attending the other one that I signed up for in July. Summer swim team is out too b/c my hand is in a cast and I can't get it in the right position for the strokes. I'll still be able to go to my karate/kickboxing classes. My sensei is being great, agreeing to work with my injury, or rather overlook it and just have me only use one hand and keep the injured one wrapped in padding and scale back my workouts. My typing abilities have dropped off dramatically as well. This chapter is shorter than any but the first, I think, but took me about ten times as long to type.

There's only one potential benefit to this whole situation. I'm testing out cross country running since it's the only school sport that I can actually participate in right now. There's no JV CC team, so it's possible that I'll be able to letter in it, get my jacket a year early, and start my collection of pins and letters early too. I never would have considered cross country if I could still play BBall, which I'd honestly much rather do. But that's not an option anymore, but neither is sitting around doing nothing. It'll piss my bitch rival off to see me in my letterman jacket this winter. Unless some of the other girls are holding back, I'd say I'm the fourth fastest right now. I've started running 2 miles every morning and 3 every evening. Going to try to build up to 4 miles every morning and evening and become the second fastest girl on the team.

I'll stop complaining and scheming now. I just needed to vent for a couple paragraphs since I haven't said much of this out loud. What all this means for you guys is basically I'll have more time to write this summer, it looks like, but I probably won't be much more productive than I had been since it's taking me so long to type. I'm planning to reread all of the PJatO books and try to keep Percy and Nico in character better. I'll also be trying to add some more Kane Chronicles emphasis in, for those who requested it. I haven't had time to let Carter and Sadie reveal their backstory to Nico and Percy yet. They've been too busy running and fighting for their lives, but next chapter Carter and Percy get to have a heart to heart and Anubis will reveal somethings that make Nico see Sadie in a new light.


	9. Chapter 9

9

Nico's eyes snapped open as, once again, he realized he had no idea where he was. A plain white ceiling with cracked paint slowly came into focus. His eyes shifted to the ugly yellow wallpaper.

_A motel room_, he thought as he rubbed his eyes. A few memories stirred in his mind; leaving the pancake house, walking to the closest motel, and bribing the man at the desk to give them a room despite the ridiculous hour. Nico's wallet had taken quite a hit from that. He would have to loot some of the hastily disposed of corpses around New York again soon.

He rolled over and discovered Percy asleep on the other side of the bed, without any covers. The older boy had folded all the blankets double and piled them over Nico, probably because the heat in the room was broken, which made things pretty chilly.

Sadie and Carter shared the other bed. Both of them were at opposite ends of the bed, so close to the edges that it was a miracle neither of them had fallen off in their sleep. Bast was curled up on the sofa.

_What time is it?_ wondered Nico. There didn't appear to be a clock anywhere in the room.

_A little bit after noon,_ answered the familiar voice in his head.

_Anubis, _Nico telepathed wearily._ Did I miss anything important?_

_ Only a rather long winded debate about sleeping arrangements. The alley cat wanted a bed to herself. Sadie and Carter had objections about sharing the same bed. It nearly became bloody._

_ They're siblings, why would they care?_ Nico wondered. _Bianca and I used to share a bed all the time._

_ They're a bit older than you and Bianca were. And they don't seem to be as close. From what I know of their past, it is . . . complicated._

_ More complicated than spending sixty years in a mind-numbing, time-warp casino, after having all their memories washed clean by the River Lethe?_

Anubis hesitated. _Sadie and Carter were raised separately after their mother died when Sadie was six. For the next six years they only saw each other two days a year, until their father tried to summon Osiris to resurrect their mother. Julius Kane ended up blowing up the Rosetta Stone and releasing Set, Isis, Horus, Nephthys, and Osiris, and allowed himself to be possessed by Osiris. Sadie and Carter were possessed by Isis and Horus, respectively._

_ Alright, they win,_ Nico surrendered. _That is complicated. But at least they're able to be together now. Unlike . . . _Nico shook his head and tried to force thoughts of his own sister from his mind. Bianca being dead couldn't be equated to the Kane siblings' situation, or their previous situation, when they lived apart. They hadn't chosen that, after all. They were just kids, powerless preteens who had to obey what grownups said. Carter didn't decide to leave Sadie because he didn't want to be saddled with the responsibility of her. Sadie didn't suddenly decide she didn't want a brother anymore.

_Sadie actually had the chance to return to a normal life, after they banished Set, _Anubis told him. _She chose to stay with Carter and help him find others with the blood of the pharaohs, to fight in the war that is on the horizon._

Nico's respect for Sadie rose several levels right then and there.

_She has hidden depths_, Anubis told him.

_I guess so,_ Nico agreed. He knew that Anubis could tell what he was thinking, and was grateful that the death god didn't make any comments about it. To cover the awkward silence that began to fill his own head, he sat up slowly and carefully, trying not to wake Percy. _I'm hungry. Is there any food in this room?_

_ I don't think so._

"Nico?"

Nico cringed. His attempts at stealth had been for naught, thanks to the crappy springs in the mattress which had amplified every move he made. "Sorry, Percy," he whispered. "I was trying not to wake you."

"It's fine," said Percy, keeping his voice soft as well. "You feeling okay?"

"Yes. Much better. Just hungry." His stomach tightened painfully as he tried to sit up, so he abandoned the attempt and laid back down.

Percy sat up, looking worried.

"Just really hungry," amended Nico.

"How about Percy and I go grab some food?" asked Carter. Like the two cousins, he kept his voice down so that he wouldn't wake anyone else up. "You don't look like you're fit to be walking very far, and it will attract a lot more attention if Percy gives you a piggy-back ride in broad daylight than it did last night."

"Or maybe," suggested Bast, "since we're all up anyway, we should talk about how to stop Hades from starting a war before we get breakfast."

All eyes turned to Sadie who groaned and sat up and scowled at Bast. "Way to rat me out Bast. Thanks a lot."

"I don't know how to stop my father," said Nico.

"Well, you haven't really been awake enough to give it much thought," said Bast.

"Even if he had been, I doubt he could have come up with anything," Percy defended him. "I've been trying to come up with another plan and I'm still not coming up with anything. Hades isn't someone you can really reason with."

"Another plan?" asked Carter. "What was your first plan?"

"Exorcise Anubis," Nico told him. "But according to Thoth that's not an option. And now I don't know what to do."

"You can't just send your dad a message saying that you're fine and killing the House of Life isn't necessary?" asked Sadie.

"Unless he sees me, he's not going to believe it's really from me," Nico told her. "And if he sees me he's going to know that I've got a foreign god's soul melded to my own. He's the god of death, remember? His vision isn't just limited to peoples' bodies, he sees their souls too. I can only think of one way that might let us get around that, but it's too dumb to try."

"How did he figure you were kidnapped by the House of Life in the first place?" asked Sadie. "Your cousin seemed to know where you really were and that we were holding you, and he's just a demigod."

"I saw part of your fight in one of my dreams," said Percy. "Not the end of the fight, so I wasn't positive he was with you, but there were no bodies when I got to Central park, besides the one Nico animated, so it seemed most likely he was with you. I figured that the House of Life freaks would have killed him if they'd won. As for figuring out where you were, it was Nico who told me that."

"I used that crystal ashtray and some water as a makeshift prism, and sent Percy an Iris message," said Nico.

"You sent your cousin flowers?" asked Sadie.

"No! Iris is a messenger goddess. Her messages are kind of like video conferences. Or web cam conferences," explained Nico. "I contacted Percy with one and he was able to find me from the vague description of my surroundings that I gave him. I don't know how my father came to the conclusion that the House of Life kidnapped me . . . oh, wait . . ." Nico grimaced. "It was that damn jackal."

_Are you talking about me?_ asked Anubis sharply.

"No, I'm talking about the jackal familiar, not you. The jackal that I sent to the underworld and dropped in front of Cerberus. If my dad saw it he'd have known that I was the one who sent it there. My power would have been stuck to it residually. If he got curious, I don't think it would have been too hard for him to tell that it was from a House of Life magician. How he got the idea that I'd been kidnapped by them . . ." Nico shrugged. "Maybe he tried to contact me but couldn't get ahold of me since I've spent the majority of the past five days being unconscious. Or is it six days now? How much time do we have left?"

"About two days," Bast told him.

"Wonderful . . ." Nico closed his eyes.

"Are you sure that you can't try talking to him?" asked Carter. "He's your dad. He should listen to you."

"He thinks I'm a naïve idiot," Nico told him.

"I thought you two were getting along better since the Battle for Olympus," said Percy.

"We are. That doesn't mean he's stopped thinking I'm a naïve idiot," sighed Nico. "But it doesn't mean he doesn't care about me either. He does, in his own way."

"Yeah. He is ready to wipe out a secret society of magicians to get you back," Percy pointed out.

"Yeah." A small smile crossed Nico's face at the thought, but it was quickly erased by his next thought. "What he'll do when he finds out I'm possessed is a worse though. And there's no way I'll be able to convince him not to start a war with the Egyptian pantheon. He'll think that I've been tricked into being Anubis' puppet."

"You can't lie to him and tell him that you became Anubis' host for the power?" asked Sadie.

Nico shook his head. "He won't buy that."

"It sounds good, but it goes against Nico's personality too much," Percy told them.

"If I lie to him, I have to either come up with something really believable, or something too ridiculous for him to think I could be making it up," said Nico.

Sadie threw her hands into the air in frustration. "Well then what are we supposed to do now?"

Nico's stomach chose that moment to growl loudly.

"I vote breakfast," said Percy. He pulled his shoes onto his feet. "Well, I guess it's lunch now, but we need to eat. We're not going to come up with anything if we haven't eaten enough to concentrate."

"That much is true," agreed Carter, pulling on his own shoes.

Sadie yawned and laid back down. "Right," she said. "You two go get some food and bring it back for us. I'm going to try to get a little bit more sleep."

Nico would have liked to have gone along, but he knew he was in no condition to. And he didn't feel like anymore embarrassing piggy-back rides, especially not in broad daylight. At night, when he'd easily passed as a sleepy child had been embarrassing enough.

"I might as well go too," grumbled Bast. "Sleeping on that sofa put a crick in my back, and I need to stretch it out."

"You two will be okay by yourselves?" Carter asked Sadie and Nico.

"Fine," Nico told him.

"Just peachy," said Sadie.

"Try to get some more sleep, if you can," Percy said to Nico. "We'll be back soon."

* * *

Carter kind of regretted not letting Bast steal a car when it turned out they had to walk two whole blocks before they reached a restaurant that served food to go. But they couldn't afford the sort of attention that a stolen car could get them, so they had to rough it out.

Finally, they reached a diner, placed an order for takeout, then sat down to wait while their food was prepared. Bast drifted off to flirt with the bus boy, leaving Carter and Percy alone in awkward silence.

"I never thanked you," said Percy after a few minutes, "for saving my cousin from that psycho-mage with the ribbons. Not everyone would have helped him like you guys did."

Carter shrugged. "He helped us first, getting rid of that jackal, and we couldn't just leave him there after that."

"Him raising that corpse would have freaked most people out," pointed out Percy.

"Sadie and I can handle a little freakiness," said Carter with a laugh. "We've been through an awful lot in the past few months. Maybe not as much as you, from the snatches we've heard of your adventures, but we've gotten a little tougher. Besides, you didn't see . . ." he trailed off, realizing it probably wasn't a good idea to tell Percy how sorry of a state Nico had been in when Aziza was finished with him, or how anyone who walked away from a child who'd been screaming in as much agony as Nico had been, would have to have been completely heartless.

"Actually," said Percy very slowly, "I did see. Demigod dreams usually aren't just dreams. We have these kind of out of body experiences that deal with things that affect us, our allies, or our enemies. So . . . well, I had front row seats to the first half of that fight. I saw what she did to him."

"Oh. Sorry." It would have given Carter nightmares to see Sadie in that condition, and from the look on Percy's face, the older boy had probably gone through the same thing. "Godling dreams can be pretty trippy too," he said, fishing for another topic, and only managing to come up with that. "We have out of body experiences too, but we kind of get new bodies that look like birds with our own human heads on them. Sadie calls me the Carter-Headed-Chicken."

Percy's expression told Carter than he recognized the change of topic for what it was, but that he was grateful for it. "Weird," he said appreciatively.

"That's actually pretty tame compared to what we went through last Christmas," said Carter. "On Christmas Eve our Dad blew up the Rosetta Stone . . ."

The next thing he knew he was spilling the entire story to Percy, all about how he and Sadie had gotten possessed by Horus and Isis, how they'd ended up on the House of Life's bad side, and everything they had done on their quest to save their father, only to finally lose him in the end. He told Percy about what had motivated his parents years ago that set them on their current path, and what the fallout from that had been, and how he and Sadie had become practically strangers after that. It was like once he'd started talking he couldn't stop. There was a big difference between telling his story to a tape recorder and telling it to an actual, living human being. Or living person. He wasn't sure whether or not demigods counted as human or not, but Percy certainly seemed human enough. More than that, he seemed like the kind of person who understood that kind of thing, though Carter didn't really know how. Something in his face hinted at the kind of wisdom that could only be gained through trials, and he didn't interrupt Carter's story, not once. He let Carter say what he needed to.

"And so now we're looking for other people with the blood of pharaohs," Carter finally concluded. "Other people who can, or already are hosting gods, so that we'll have a fighting chance against Apophis. We're looking for Zia along the way, of course, but right now we have no idea where she is, so that's kind of hard. I really want to find her but . . . I can't be selfish. We need allies, and so far we're not doing too well, so we've been putting priority on that."

"Well," said Percy, when he realized Carter was finished, "I don't mean to sound arrogant, but I don't think you're doing so bad finding allies. A demigod and the world's only demigodling aren't anything to sneeze at, especially if they're both sons of the Big Three."

Carter blinked then smiled. "You're our allies now then?"

"We're in this mess together, aren't we?" Percy asked. "You guys are the only ones who might be able to help Nico figure out how to control his new godling powers. If he can do magic, he'll need your help. In return he'll fight for you and so will I. Saving the world from a chaotic entity isn't exactly anything new for us. Remind me to tell you about our adventures sometime."

"From the references you've made to them they sound . . . extreme," Carter said.

"Oh yeah," Percy agreed. "But yours haven't exactly been easy either. You and Sadie, growing up separated . . . that must have been hard too."

"It was lonely sometimes," Carter said, then immediately wished he could take that back. It made him sound weak, and weak was the last thing he wanted to appear to be in front of Percy. The older boy was way past cool. There was no other way to describe him. He practically radiated confidence and control, the way his cousin radiated death. Carter was willing to bet that Percy was one of the popular kids at his school, or if not there then at least at the demigod camp that he and Nico had mentioned. But there was more to him than just being cool. Percy just seemed . . . good. Responsible and kind. The kind of guy who made you want to follow his example and be a better person.

"I was an only child," Percy told Carter. "I got lonely sometimes too. My mom had married a complete loser and I was always getting expelled from whatever school I went to, so I never had a chance to make and keep many friends."

"You? Expelled? More than once?" Carter couldn't believe it.

Percy shrugged. "Monsters are drawn to demigods. They showed up, complications occurred, and I got blamed."

"Oh." That made a lot more sense.

"Of course, I have about a million half-siblings," said Percy, "but most of them are cyclopses. That doesn't necessarily mean they're bad!" he added hastily. "They're just not the sharpest swords in the armory, though they can certainly forge them."

"Aren't some of them . . . well . . ." Carter didn't want to offend Percy, but he had heard some of the myths. " . . . not good?"

"Yeah," Percy said darkly. "There are plenty of bad ones. Plenty of good ones too though, but I'm only really close to one of them. Tyson. He's saved my life quite a few times. He spends most of his time under the sea now though, with Dad, so I guess the relative I'm closest to, other than my mom is Nico. He's kind of become like a little brother to me too, but don't tell him I said that. It might upset him. He's got more issues with his family than most demigods, and I don't know what will set him off and what he'll be okay with."

"I won't say anything," promised Carter. "Do you have any advice on being a big brother though? You've got more experience than me. I'm still learning the ropes."

"You're doing fine," Percy assured him. "I'm not sure it's the kind of thing anyone can teach you how to do anyway."

Carter considered this. "Probably not," he agreed after a moment. "But can you tell me, does it get easier after you spend more time with them?"

It was Percy's turn to consider. "Yes," he said finally. "I think so. After you get to know them better I guess you adjust to each other. But even if it never got any easier, I think it would still be worth it."

This time Carter didn't have to think about it before agreeing. "Yeah," he said. "I think they are worth it."

* * *

"Do you mind if I put on the telly?" Sadie asked several minutes after Percy, Carter, and Bast had left. Sleep was proving to be elusive and she was starting to get bored waiting for the food.

"Huh?" Nico asked sleepily. "The what?"

"I suppose you Yanks call them TVs or televisions," Sadie translated. "So do you mind if I turn it on or what?"

She saw Nico frown and thought he was going to object. Then of course she would have turned it on anyway just to spite him. But Nico hesitated briefly then closed his eyes and turned onto his side so that he faced away from the room's television.

"It's okay," he muttered.

Sadie hesitated. "You don't sound very enthusiastic about it."

"I don't feel good."

It was Sadie's turn to frown. "Don't feel good how?" she asked. "Like you're sick or like . . . you're being burned up from the inside out?" She hoped it was the former and not the latter. Not everyone could handle being a god's host, let alone a really powerful god's host, and as far as they knew, Nico's bloodline didn't stretch back to the pharaohs, which made him less likely to be compatible. Then again, his mother was Italian, a daughter of Rome as it were. If Sadie remembered right, Rome had been a melting pot of cultures, absorbing what they conquered if it seemed useful enough. And there had been precedence enough for Romans taking Egyptian wives, so maybe Nico did have some pharaoh blood after all. Or maybe he was strong enough to host Anubis even without it. Sadie didn't know and didn't really care about the details of it, just as long as he was strong enough to be a host. She didn't particularly like Nico. He was making her life very difficult after all, but she didn't like the idea of Anubis unintentionally burning him out like a cheap battery. Death Boy was kind of growing on her now that she'd had a chance to see a couple glimpses of the real him. She had a feeling that accidentally killing Nico would weigh pretty hard on Anubis' conscience too, so for her favorite god's sake, she hoped Nico wasn't deteriorating as they spoke.

"I'm not being burned up by god essence," murmered Nico as though he knew what Sadie was thinking. "If hosting Anubis was going to kill me, I think it would have done so by now. I just grossly overused my powers last night. That's why I'm drained."

"Oh." Sadie put down the remote control. "So when you do that shadow travel thing it usually takes that much out of you?"

Nico gave a tired chuckle. "It usually tires me out, yeah. Until last night I'd never taken passengers. Last week I probably would have killed myself trying the stuff I did last night. I'm a little surprised that I'm still alive right now."

"You . . . really put yourself in danger doing that shadow thing?"

"When you say it like that it makes me sound stupid," muttered Nico.

"Or brave," pointed out Sadie.

"Same difference."

Sadie smiled. "You're not so bad, Death Boy."

Nico turned his face toward Sadie and an odd expression crossed his face. It looked like he was trying to smile, but his muscles seemed to be rebelling and his eyes fluttered like a hummingbird's wings as he attempted to keep them open. "Thanks. Neither are you."

"Is this the part where we hug and decide to be friends?" asked Sadie sarcastically. She couldn't start being too nice all of a sudden, after all.

"This is the part where I go back to sleep," Nico told her, abandoning any attempts at keeping his eyes open.

Sadie laid back down on her own bed. "I'll leave the telly off. There's probably nothing good on at this hour. I hope Bast and our brothers get back soon. I'm starving." She cut her glance toward Nico, waiting for the correction, ready with a teasing remark that she hoped would get under his skin, but the correction never came. It appeared that Nico had drifted off.

_Oh well. Plenty of time to annoy him later._ Sadie closed her eyes, but a noise from the door had her opening them right back up. She waited for the door to swing open, and for Bast, Percy, and Carter to come back in, hopefully with some delicious takeout.

Instead the door flew off its hinges, all the way across the room and into the wall. Sadie rolled off the bed and down behind it, reaching into the Duat for her staff even as she hit the carpet.

"Hello, pet," said a familiar and despised voice.

"You . . ." Nico was still on his bed, struggling to sit up, but his strength seemed to keep failing him. Sadie could see the fear in his eyes as his own body betrayed him. He wasn't going to be any use in a fight. He could barely even move.

That meant it was up to Sadie to hold these House of Life punks off until the big kids and their resident cat goddess returned.

"Ha-di!" she shouted, aiming at Aziza's staff.

Hieroglyphics glowed in the air as Aziza countered Sadie's attack, then conjured a giant serpent. The snake shot forward toward Sadie with the speed of an arrow, and before she even knew that it had reached her, she was wrapped up in its coils like a mouse in the grasp of a rat snake.

"Bloody hell!" Sadie struggled, but that only caused the snake to wrap around her even tighter. So tight she could barely breathe. "Nico, run!"

"I don't think he can," Aziza said, striding forward to the bed just as Nico managed to roll off of it. For a second Sadie thought that meant he would be able to flee, but Aziza was right there in front of him, standing over him with a nasty smile on her cold face. "Poor little demigod. You overused your powers, didn't you? You see, I read up on you while I was waiting for reports on your whereabouts to come in. What you did last night should have been impossible. Your little escape trip through the shadows. And doing it more than once . . ." she gave a sadistic little laugh. "It wore you all out, didn't it, pet?"

"Stop calling me that." There was fear in Nico's voice but nothing even close to submission.

"Why?" Aziza asked, kneeling down over him. Something circular gleamed red and gold in her hand. "You're such a cute little thing, after all. You remind me of a puppy, and until we turn you back over to your dear, loving father, you're going to be collared like one." She snapped the gold circlet around Nico's neck and it flared with light.

"Ahhhh!" Nico's hands didn't fly to his neck so much as flounder there, shaking like an addict's as he tried to tug at the collar.

"There, there." Aziza patted him on the head. "Nothing to worry about. That collar won't damage you. It'll just keep you too weak to try to escape while you enjoy our hospitality." She stood and stretched. "Hakim. Carry my pet for me, would you? And Abraham, get that thing." She nodded toward Sadie.

"L-l-l-let her g-go," Nico gasped. "Sh-sh-she's n-not inv-v-volved –"

"Oh, but she is," Aziza told him. "Your father ordered that you be returned to him, and that the ones responsible for your kidnapping be given to him as well."

"But I didn't kidnap him!" Sadie managed to gasp out. "I saved him from you and your stupid ribbons!"

"A minor detail, one which Lord Hades won't be concerned about, I'm sure." Aziza gave Sadie another nasty smile.

"I'll t-t-t-tell him the t-t-truth," Nico whispered.

"Which is why we'll have to sacrifice her to your father before we turn you over. Sadie Kane, her brother, and their pet god have been a thorn in our side for far too long."

"N-n-n-no!" shouted Nico. At least he tried to shout anyway. It came out as more of a raspy stutter, and then Hakim hauled him off the ground and threw him over one of his shoulders, none too gently.

One of Aziza's other hench magicians came over to Sadie but hesitated. "Aziza, the snake?"

Aziza sighed and snapped her fingers and the snake dissolved.

Sadie immediately made a dive for her staff, but Abraham caught her, squeezing her just as tightly as the snake had, and Sadie was sure she could feel a couple of her ribs start to crack. She kicked wildly and felt her foot connect with something soft. Abraham yowled and released her, and she made another break for freedom –

- only to find her path blocked by a short, Middle Eastern woman in one of the motel's housekeeping uniforms. Hieroglyphics appeared in the air around Sadie, and she had just enough time to realize that they were the symbols for "sleep" before her eyes drooped and her knees buckled. She was unconscious before she hit the floor.

* * *

Thanks everyone who wished me a successful recovery in their reviews, and also thank you for the book recommendations. I got a gift card to the local bookstore as a get well present, so I'll be going there again soon.

Also, I must give a big thank you to Lostbeyondreason for that awesome picture you drew of Nico and Anubis playing Mythomagic in a graveyard. For anyone who wants to see it, I'll be putting a link to it in my profile. It's awesome! Thank you so much! Your fan art just made my entire summer!


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Hades met Poseidon on the banks of the River Acheron. The sea god had come alone. That was surprising, given the old enmity between the Big Three sons of Kronos. Then again, ever since Hades and Poseidon had showed up to save the day at Olympus, all of the Olympian Gods had been getting along much better. Now Poseidon was meeting him in his own realm, without so much as a single guard to make sure Hades didn't have him chained in Tartarus. If they weren't careful, they'd soon be wearing tights and carrying rapiers and translating "All for one, and one for all" into Greek to use as their motto.

It was a scary thought. Hades decided that when the current situation was over, he was going to send something nasty to bother Zeus' youngest demigod daughter. Maybe a pack of hell hounds. Of course, that would have to wait. He had more pressing matters to attend right now, and might actually need Zeus' aid. There would be time for stirring up havoc later.

"Hades," Poseidon greeted his brother with a deep nod that was almost a bow, showing proper respect for the master of the underworld while in his domain.

"Poseidon." Hades returned the gesture. "I thank you for coming."

Poseidon looked behind Hades, like he was searching for something specific, something that he didn't find. "No contingent of horrors to intimidate my guards?" he asked, a teasing note in his voice.

"No guards for my contingent of horrors to intimidate?" returned Hades. Then he paused, realizing that he was engaging in almost friendly banter with his brother and felt disgusted with himself.

"I didn't believe that your invitation held any ill intents," Poseidon told him, "and as such came alone."

"I would thank you for your trust, if I didn't think it was a sure sign of stupidity on your part," growled Hades. "You should take nothing for granted in my realm, brother, not even your own safety from me."

"I don't think you're too anxious to have the underworld flooded," remarked Poseidon with a benevolent air. "At least not as anxious as you are to discuss whatever you called me here today to discuss. I might be mistaken, but in your message you sounded worried."

"I'm the god of death! I do not worry!"

Poseidon raised his hands. "Then I was mistaken. But what did you want to talk about, brother? In all the millennium we've ruled our domains, I have never before gotten so much as a birthday card from you before. Now, all of a sudden, you send me an Iris message and request a face to face meeting, and at the very least, you showed signs of urgency."

Hades scowled, but gave Poseidon a straight answer. "The House of Life has kidnapped my son."

One of Poseidon's eyebrows rose in surprise. "Your demigod son?"

"How many sons do I have that aren't demigods?" demanded Hades. He grimaced. "Yes, my demigod son. My only living son. His name is Nico, you might remember, since he is good friends with your precious progeny, and since his very existence was cause for so much concern seventy years ago."

Poseidon nodded. "Nico di Angelo. If I remember correctly, he had a sister –"

"Deceased," said Hades in a clipped voice.

Poseidon said nothing. He just waited for Hades to continue.

"Of all the gods, I have the least children," Hades said through clenched teeth, since this was something of a sorepoint for him. "No godly children, or monsters like you and the rest of my beloved siblings. Only humans have enough life to bear my children, and more than nine times out of ten they're dead before they're even born. Those who survive . . . I feel a certain responsibility for."

"There's no shame in admitting you love your son, brother."

"I do not love my son!" spat Hades. "He is naïve and idiotic, and quite possibly touched in the head! But he is an embodiment of my power in the human world and I will not have him in the hands of those mad magicians who tried to kill all their own gods! I am getting him back. One way or another they will return my son, even if I have to kill them all and make their reanimated corpses hand him over!"

"Your minions are certainly suited to the task of a massacre and extraction," noted Poseidon. "Unless he is being held under water? Or on one of my sacred islands? If that is the case, I give you permission to retrieve him by any means necessary."

Hades almost stumbled over his speech. That was a very generous offer. A very, very generous offer. One that he was sure Poseidon would never have made before the Battle of Olympus. He almost couldn't believe that Poseidon had made that offer. _Perhaps it is because his spawn has befriended my son, _he thought._ Poseidon has always indulged his children_.

"Thank you," he grated out, "but that is not why I asked you here. I do not know where my son is being held."

Poseidon looked surprised. "You cannot connect with him mentally?"

Hades shook his head. "I have been blocked. No mere magician has the sort of power to block a god's connection with his offspring."

This made Poseidon look grim. "You believe that a godling is holding him?"

Hades nodded.

Poseidon issued several colorful curses in ancient and modern Greek. "That filthy parasite pantheon," he swore. "Around the time they fell to the Roman Empire, I had to send a toxic algal bloom into the Nile because they kept kidnapping my children and trying to infect them with their water gods. They killed seven of my sons and four of my daughters."

A sickening feeling stirred in Hades at that thought. He hadn't even _had_ eleven demigod children total, in his existence, and Poseidon had lost that many in a single generation. He remembered the incident Poseidon spoke of. It was not often back then that he was able to lay claim to any Egyptian souls, but Poseidon's actions had marked thousands of them, destined them to the Greek underworld when they died of poisons inflicted by the Greek pantheon's sea god.

"I will not let them have their way with my son," said Hades flatly.

"Is it the House of Life holding him though? Or a rogue-magician-turned-godling?" asked Poseidon. A good question, considering that the House of Life had beaten the Greek pantheon to the punch in declaring war on the Egyptian pantheon so many centuries ago. They had turned their back on their gods, blamed them for their own military shortcomings, and sealed them all way, but recently a great number of them had broken out of their prisons. Hades did not know, or particularly care, if the House of Life had accepted their gods back.

"I do not know," he confessed to Poseidon. "And it does not matter. Whoever has my son will return him to me or they and anyone who aids them will die. I don't care if I have to wage war against the House of Life while they're united with their parasite pantheon! If they harm Nico I will kill them all!"

Thanks to recent events, Hades was strong. Maybe stronger than he'd ever been before. The entire Greek pantheon had gotten a boost in strength since so many of their children had become war heroes. Once, if the House of Life and their parasite gods had presented a united front, they might have been able to destroy the Greeks. But now they wouldn't have a chance. It would be a slaughter of the very best kind.

"I have never asked a thing of you, brother," Hades appealed to Poseidon. "You or any of the other Olympians. I have never tried to seize or infringe upon what is yours or Zeus's, even though my lot was the worst amongst us three. I am content with what is mine, but now something of mine has been taken and I want it back! I want _him_ back! _My_ son. If they do not return him then I will start a war."

"And I will go to war alongside you, brother."

An emotion that Hades couldn't place surged through him. Comraderie maybe? Gratitude? It was similar to the affection he felt for his own children when he was at his most indulgent, and Hades decided that whatever it was, really was not important. What mattered was that one of his brothers would be on his side in the coming conflict. Even if he had no other allies, two of the Big Three would crush any who stood against them. But of course they would have allies. Ares was in by default. Athena would rationalize out some way to convince herself that joining them would be wise, which would of course have nothing to do with her war goddess powers singing in her blood. Apollo had quite a bit of vendetta against the Egyptians, and though Artemis acted as though she hated her twin, she would never let him go to war without her.

If his son was not restored to him in less than two days now, there would be hell to pay.

* * *

The moment Percy saw the door of their motel room he knew that something was very wrong. Doors blown off hinges usually were bad signs. Riptide was in his hand in an instant and he sprinted forward, dropping the stack of Styrofoam food boxes he'd been carrying.

"Nico!" he shouted bursting into the room. Aside from the door, not much was wrong with the room, except for the fact that his cousin and Carter's sister were missing. "Nico!"

"Sadie!" Carter and Bast were right behind him.

"They're gone." Percy knew that he was stating the obvious but he didn't know what else to say.

"Sadie!" Carter dropped to his knees to check under the beds, then ran to the closet. "Sadie! Nico? Where are you?"

"Magic did this," said Bast from the remains of the door.

"Egyptian magic?" asked Percy, just to make sure they weren't dealing with some new problem that shouldn't have existed outside of scifi novels, like some Romanian vampire ghost with a magic boomerang of ultimate doom.

"Yes. House of Life magic in particular," Bast said, looking around the room like she could see something he couldn't. "Each magician has their own signature of magic. This one belongs to the woman who led the attack on our house."

"Aziza," Percy remembered. He also remembered her eyes taking on an even crueler gleam every time they fell on Nico. The thought of his cousin in her hands was not a pleasant one.

"We have to get them back," said Carter. "If the House of Life turns Nico over to his father then Hades will see he's possessed by Anubis. And Sadie might get hurt too, if not by Hades then definitely by Desjardins and his henchmen."

"They'll have taken them to the First Nome," said Bast. "That's the safest place for the House of Life to keep anything, and I doubt they have anything they want to protect more than their son of Hades hostage."

"The First Nome's in Egypt?" asked Percy to make sure he remembered what Carter had told him right.

Bast nodded. "I can get there faster on my own and try to scout things out and see where they're keeping them. Carter can open a gate to get the two of you there."

"Will it work on me?" asked Percy. "I'm pretty sure I don't have any blood of the pharaohs, and this whole mixing of Greek and Egyptian powers seems more and more dangerous the more we learn about it. I don't want to end up getting blasted into molecules and spread from here to Gaza."

"Giza," Carter corrected him.

"You should be okay," said Bast. "I think."

"Has any demigod ever traveled that way before that you know of?" asked Percy.

Bast's silence told him everything he needed to know.

"What if I use the all-rivers-become-one spell?" asked Carter. "That's safe enough, I know. Sadie and I used it to get Nico from Central Park to the mansion."

"Then do that," Bast told them. "We need to move quickly. We don't know if the House of Life has a way of contacting Hades or if they have to wait until the time he set down for them."

* * *

When Sadie woke up she was lying on a grimy stone floor in what appeared to be a prison cell. The hieroglyphics for "light" had been inscribed on the wall outside the cell and were lit up, providing a dim glow that allowed her to see. And there was a cold hand resting on her throat. Not choking her, just resting there. Her eyes widened as she realized how cool its flesh was. No human could be that cold and still be alive.

She shrieked and flung the corpse hand off of her, rolling and scooting backward to get away from the body. Then she stopped as she realized who it was. Nico stared up at her from the floor through exhausted, tortured eyes. He didn't bother moving his arm which was now stretched out on the ground. He didn't bother moving at all except to close his eyes.

"Nico?" she asked, moving closer to him again.

"Are you okay?" asked Nico, his voice very soft like he was fading away.

"Yes. I'm fine. They only put a sleep spell on me. And put these on me too, I guess," she said, noticing the handcuffs that bound her wrists. There was a decent length of chain between the two cuffs that let her move, not as freely as she was used to, but they could have been much worse. She moved closer to the demigodling, who now was resting with his face in the dirt. Carefully, she rolled him onto his back and dusted off his face with the back of her hand. "Are you okay? Your skin is as cold as ice."

"I know," muttered Nico. "It always is. You thought my hand belonged to a corpse when you woke up?"

"Yeah, sorry." Sadie faked a laugh.

"Didn't mean to scare you. Anubis was worried. Told me to check your pulse or he'd do it himself. I was checking."

"You being cold, is that one of your demigod powers?"

"More of a side-effect," Nico told her. "I'm not . . . I'm not as alive as normal people are. Not warm blooded. No body heat."

"Sounds bloody inconvenient," said Sadie. "Are you cold?"

"Usually."

"Right now?"

"Yes."

"I'm sorry. If I had a jacket I'd give it to you." Sadie only had on the t-shirt and jeans she'd fallen asleep in. And her socks. Her combat boots were missing. Nico's too, it looked like. He was missing his jacket as well. Sadie could see a slight bulge beneath his shirt in the center of his chest. It looked like he was wearing some kind of amulet or a medal under his shirt but Sadie knew better. It was that stupid stone that had somehow replaced his heart. "They haven't noticed that yet, have they?" asked Sadie.

Nico blinked at her, confused.

"You know. I don't want to say it out loud in case our conversation is being _bugged_."

"Oh. No," said Nico. "They didn't search me. They didn't see a need to. I can't fight them. I can't even sit up."

"Because of that collar?" asked Sadie.

"Mmm." That seemed to be a yes.

Sadie started twisting the collar, rotating it around Nico's neck and looking for a clasp to remove it.

Nico's eyes went unfocused for a moment then seemed to sharpen as he looked at Sadie. When he spoke it was in Anubis' voice. "I'm sorry Sadie, but it's no use. This collar is magic, as are your handcuffs. The only one who can undo them is the person who put them on you."

"You can't use your powers and take them off?" asked Sadie.

"I cannot." Anubis gave his strange smile that looked odd, but somehow right on Nico's face. "This collar is a particularly nasty piece of work."

"What kind of spell is it?" asked Sadie as she looked at the hieroglyphics carved into the stones on it.

"A healing spell," said Anubis wryly. "It's emitting essence of life, and a lot of it, much like the Ribbons of Hathor did. It negates Nico's powers. Not just his powers. It's . . . hard to explain, but . . . the children of Hades aren't completely alive. The power that they use to animate corpses also animates them."

"So that thing is killing him?" asked Sadie, horrified.

"Gradually." Anubis' expression made it clear that he was trying to sugar coat it. Sadie wasn't quite sure how she was able to read the death god so well, but she could tell that he was very sad. "But I think he has a few days. Percy, Carter, and the stupid cat will have you out of here by then."

_He's lying_. Sadie tried to smile reassuringly, to make him think that she believed the lie, but she knew it didn't reach her eyes_. Nico's got a day at the most. Maybe not even that. _

"Don't count him out yet," Anubis told her. "And you know how resourceful his cousin is. Or at least you have a general idea. I hope I am around to see your expression when you hear of some of their real exploits."

_I don't want Nico to die._ Sadie turned her face away and wiped tears from her eyes, hoping that Nico and Anubis wouldn't see them. She cringed as she realized the side of her hand had a long scrape on it, like whoever had carried her made it a point to let her hand drag on the ground. Red blood oozed slowly from the cut. _Red blood . . ._

"Black blood!" said Sadie out loud. She crawled quickly to Nico/Anubis' side. "I know how to get that collar off you!"

"Sadie," said Anubis patiently, "it's not possible. I'm sorry."

"It is possible," insisted Sadie. "I know how. I don't want to explain it in case they're recording us and can either hear or lip read, but I can do it. It will hurt a little, but I know it will work. Do you trust me?"

"It's your body," Anubis said, but not to Sadie. She guessed that he was having a conversation with Nico in his head and had lost track of what he was supposed to say out loud, just like Nico tended to do.

When he spoke again, it was in Nico's voice. "Do it," Nico told her. "If you think you can, do whatever it takes."

Sadie got to her feet and grabbed Nico under his arms and from behind. She pulled him into a corner so it would be impossible for any cameras to see what she was doing, unless they were positioned right above her, looking down. Then she lifted Nico's hand, wondering what the best way to do this was. It would have been easier if she had a knife or something to cut with, but she didn't. She didn't even have fingernails.

As she realized what she had to do she grimaced. "I really am sorry about this," she told him, leaning down over his hand. "If we both get out of here alive, I promise I'll buy you a Happy Meal to make it up to you."

Nico blinked at her, confused. His eyes went even wider when Sadie pulled his left hand up to her mouth and bit down on one of his fingertips, hard. "What in Dad's name are you doing!"

Sadie didn't answer. She concentrated on getting her teeth to pierce his skin, just his skin. She was careful not to crunch down on the tiny bones in his fingers. Broken fingers was the last thing he needed right now. She just needed to draw blood.

Seconds later, she felt her teeth start to fizzle, like a calcium tablet dropped in acid. She drew back immediately and wiped her teeth on her sleeve, then spat a few times, hoping that her saliva would wash away the traces of Nico's black blood. It must have because her teeth stopped making that fizzling sound, and she didn't feel pain like she was pretty sure she would have if they were being dissolved.

Blood was streaming freely from Nico's finger by the time she was finished with that. She frowned when she saw that she'd dropped his hand so that it lay over his lower torso, and that he hadn't had the strength to move it. Already she could see that his blood had burned a hole in his shirt. Oddly, it didn't seem to have any effect on his skin, though she supposed that made sense. He wouldn't still be alive if his skin couldn't hold the blood inside of him.

She carefully lifted his hand again, making sure that she didn't get any blood on herself, because she doubted that her skin had the same immunity. Nico watched her with glazed eyes as she used his fingers wipe the blood onto the collar.

"Please let this work," she prayed, though she wasn't sure to who. Perhaps to her parents, though in her experience they'd never come through for her before so they probably weren't the best choice. Nico's dad didn't seem like such a great choice either at the moment, and if Anubis could do anything to get the collar off Nico he would have already done it, so he was out too. Thoth, maybe. Good old Jahooty. If this worked, then it was a good idea, which made her smart. Wise even, so Sadie figured that this fell under his category of prayers.

The metal of the collar started to hiss and smoke. Tears sprang to Sadie's eyes and a fierce grin lit up her face. "It's working! Thank you, Jahooty!"

It took less time than Sadie thought it would. In less than a minute Nico's black blood had melted right through the metal clasp that kept him enslaved by the collar. She twisted the contraption off of him then smashed it against the floor as hard as she could.

"Useless piece of garbage!" she spat at it, glad to have something to vent her anger on. "Trash! Camel shit! You're lucky I don't have a volcano to throw you in! Now die!"

When she was finished with it, the only thing it could have possibly resembled was an ugly piece of modern art, all twisted and warped beyond any recognizable shape. She threw it against the far wall in case there was any life left radiating out of it to poison her friend, or friends since Nico and Anubis both had to be considered, even if they were sharing the same body.

"You killed it good," said Nico, smiling up at her tiredly, but looking stronger already.

"It got off easy," huffed Sadie. "What I'd really like to do is melt it down and then drip it in Aziza's eyes. Do you think the hot metal would burn through them and sink into her brain?"

"Anubis says it would, and it's been done before, but not enough to be clichéd," reported Nico dutifully.

Sadie chuckled. "You're feeling better? You look like you're feeling better."

Nico nodded. "Everything was heavy before . . . fuzzy . . . now it's lighter and clearer. I think I can sit up –"

"Don't," Sadie told him. "Not yet anyway. Save your strength."

She was kind of surprised that Nico obeyed, since she would have tried sitting up just to spite anyone who gave her that order. She guessed that Nico was too tired, or maybe was more obedient than her. Whichever it was, she decided not to hold it against him.

"Chain."

Sadie looked down at Nico confused. "Sorry, mate, what was that?"

"Chain," Nico said again. "Handcuffs." He raised his still bleeding hand.

"Oh. Good thinking." Sadie held the chain out to him and let him wipe some of his blood onto one of the links. Seconds later, she was able to twist the link apart. The metal bands remained on her wrists, with a short length of chain attached to either one, but they didn't obstruct her movements anymore.

"Best I can do right now," Nico told her. "I'll get the rest of it off later, but I don't want to burn you."

"Yeah, they're fine like this for now," replied Sadie. "If I backhand anyone it'll be more likely to make them bleed."

"I'm not ready to make a jail break yet," Nico told her. "Still too weak. But . . . I'm getting stronger."

"Rest," Sadie said to him. "Hopefully they'll feed us. That'll do you good, right?"

"Mmmm." Nico closed his eyes. "I wish Percy was here."

Sadie shifted so that she was laying next to Nico. "You two seem really close. If I didn't know better, I'd really believe you two were brothers."

"Nah . . . if you knew me you wouldn't think that. We're not really that much alike."

"Sure you are. You're both demigods. You both have dark hair. You're both freaky-good fighters."

"He's a good person. Much better than me."

"How so?" Sadie wanted to know.

"He's just . . . good. Righteous. Like light. I'm dark and cold. The best thing that can be said about me is that Percy's my friend."

Sadie sighed. She'd never been very good with words or at comforting people, let alone demigodlings. Normally she probably would have ignored Nico and let him keep talking pitiably, but after thinking she was going to be sharing her cell with his corpse she had a little more compassion for him than she normally would have.

She rolled over so that she was leaning into Nico and flung one arm over his chest, kind of hugging him, and thinking that if they were both a year or two older, that this would be really awkward. But thankfully, adolescence hadn't set in for Nico yet and he was enough of a kid that she could hug him like this, and try to keep him warm, and he wouldn't get any weird ideas. "If you're cold you should let your friends keep you warm. And if you pair that dark thing up with mysteriousness you'll get more dates. And Percy does seem like the kind of person anyone would be proud to call their friend, but there are better things that can be said of a boy who will defend two other kids he just met from a magician with murderous intent."

Nico didn't answer for a moment and Sadie was starting to worry that she might have crossed some line she shouldn't have, and hoping that Nico had just fallen asleep.

"You're warm," said Nico, just when Sadie had given up any hope of getting an answer.

"In a year or two, when puberty hits, you'll be thinking I'm hot," Sadie promised him. "But this would be really awkward if you thought that now, so I'll settle for warm right now."

"You're a good sister."

"Beg pardon?" Now Sadie was starting to wonder if Nico was even really awake.

"To Carter. You're a good sister. Anubis told me how you had a chance to go back to a normal life, but stayed with him. Bianca left me."

"Bianca was . . . your sister?"

"Mmm."

"What was Percy sorry about then?" she wondered.

"She did something stupid and almost got them all killed. Percy came up with a plan to save 'em but she stole it and used the plan instead of him and died."

"Oh." Sadie blinked at Nico and suddenly a few more things about him made sense. She wasn't quite sure who the 'they' he was referring to were, but could tell that it at least included Bianca and Percy. "I'm sorry."

"I am too. Sometimes. But sometimes not. She wouldn't be with me even if she was alive. She abandoned me. But now Percy helps me. It really is like having a big brother, but one without authority issues. So I'm not lonely. But if he didn't feel bad that Bianca died, he might not look out for me. So even though Bianca died . . . I can't feel sorry that Percy's here for me because of it. Does that make me a bad person?"

"You don't really know what you're saying right now, do you?" asked Sadie. She had the feeling that this was the sort of thing Nico would never say if he was really coherent, not even to the people he was closest to. Exhaustion was affecting his judgment and had him babbling his greatest insecurities to someone he barely knew.

"No. Not really."

Sadie sighed. "Get some sleep. Then we can plan a jailbreak."

* * *

AN

The day after tomorrow I'm getting surgery on my hand again, so I probably won't be typing anything that day, and maybe not the day after, depending on what pain meds they give me, but if I can I'll try to write some. Lostbeyondreason's great fanart gave me quite a bit of motivation. If you haven't checked it out yet, please do! There's a link to it in my profile. It's good for a smile, or in my case a big grin that I've been wearing for the past two days, lol. Beside that, I'm glad I was able to finish and post this chapter before surgery.

A couple of people have asked about other characters showing up in their reviews, or expressed regret that some of them won't be showing up in this story, so I wanted to leave a note about that. Just because they're not in this adventure doesn't mean they won't be in future stories in this AU. I have some ideas planned for other stories that involve getting these characters involved, like one with Nico not wanting Annabeth to know about his heart scarab or the fact that he's possessed, even though Percy wants to tell her. It's not that Nico doesn't like her, he just doesn't want to trust anymore people than he absolutely has to with a secret that puts his life in danger. Of course Annabeth's no fool and realizes that the boys are keeping something from her and tries to figure out what, based on the information she gathers around them . . . and comes to the conclusion that Nico's got a split personality.

This fic's emphasis has mainly been about brotherhood or siblinghood and I've been trying to keep the plot fast moving like Mr. Riordan's books. Bringing in more characters once everything got into motion would slow that down, since they'd have to be filled in and I'd need a good reason for them showing up, or the main characters would have to take time to go get them, and it would also take away from the siblinghood points I was trying to emphasize. At least that's what I think. I am anxiously anticipating the next KC book because I want to know what happens with Zia, and I want to use her as a character while staying as true to the canon as I can. (So let's see, Carter likes Zia, who's possessed by Nephthys who's married to the evil god Set, and also happens to be Anubis' mother, who's is currently possessing Nico, who might be starting to like Sadie, who is definately interested in Anubis . . . oh yeah. That's going to be fun, lol.)

Also, the Kanes and our demigod boys will be sharing more of their backstories with each other when they get the chance. They're kind of on a whirlwind adventure right now, when every time they spin around someone's trying to attack them and Nico's on the verge of unconsciousness. Doesn't leave a whole lot of time for chatting about the past, so they're learning about each other in bits and pieces. So be assured that the Kanes will be learning how badass our demigod boys are in due time.


	11. Chapter 11

11

After Bast left, Percy and Carter quickly gathered the things that had been left behind when the House of Life freaks kidnapped their kinsmen. Carter saw Percy looking sadly at Nico's aviator jacket as the older boy picked it up. Then Percy glanced up and saw Carter watching him.

"I should have left it on him last night," he said regretfully, before Carter could look away, embarrassed. "I knew he gets cold easily."

"You couldn't have known he'd be abducted right out of his bed," pointed out Carter.

Percy didn't look comforted. He reached into one of the pockets and pulled out Nico's black switchblade. "Now he doesn't even have his weapon. Unless . . ." Percy tossed the knife (still folded) across the room. It hit the wall then slid down between the wall and the bed.

"What did you do that for?" Carter asked and went to retrieve it, but it wasn't there. He knelt down and looked under the bed but didn't see it there either. Confused, he looked back at Percy who was checking the jacket pockets again.

"It didn't come back here," he said, smiling, then saw Carter's bemused expression. "It's a magic weapon," he explained. "It always returns to its owner, unless its owner deliberately leaves it somewhere, like in the pocket of their jeans that they put in their locker during gym." He made a face which led Carter to think Percy had once done just that, and then, for whatever reason, found himself needing a sword during gym class. "But they can't be lost or stolen. If someone else moves it, as soon as it's out of their sight it usually returns to its owner. So hopefully it's back with Nico now."

"Hopefully," agreed Carter. He felt a pang when he packed up Sadie's combat boots but pushed his worries aside. "You ready?"

Percy nodded. "Let's go."

They left the motel on foot, walking quickly and keeping an eye out for anyone who might have been following them. The river wasn't exactly close, but wasn't far enough away to call a cab to take them there. The time they probably would have had to wait for one would have made it about as long as it took for them to walk there. Plus a taxi would have been too easy for someone to follow.

"Do you have some sort of magical means of summoning a boat?" asked Percy as they approached the river. "Or should I take care of that?"

Carter was surprised. "You know how to hotwire a boat?"

"Not hotwire. Just control them. My dad's the patron god of sailors."

"Oh. Well you don't need to," Carter assured him. "I've got it covered." He paused to take stock of his magic kit.

Percy kept walking right down the river bank. Abruptly, he drew up short and went rigid with surprise.

"What's wrong?" asked Carter when he noticed this. He started to step forward again, but Percy raised a hand sharply, motioning him to stay back.

"Dad?" he asked loudly, looking down at the surface of the water where his reflection should have been. Carter had the feeling that it was for his benefit that Percy had raised his voice, not because the sea god was hard of hearing.

"Percy," said a voice from the river, presumably Poseidon. Carter was surprised by the voice. Poseidon sounded friendly, like he was a nice guy. From what he remembered from the myths, the guy wasn't always that great. But maybe he put on a good face around his children. There was definitely some concern in his voice. "You're safe. I'm glad."

"Why wouldn't I be safe?" asked Percy.

"It's . . . a complicated answer." Suddenly the voice got sharp. "Percy, what are you doing in Memphis?"

"Uh, I was, uh . . . field trip." Percy obviously wasn't a very good liar.

"A field trip?" Poseidon was definitely suspicious now.

"Yeah . . . but my ADHD kicked in and I had to get out of there. Graceland, I mean. Big mansion made of limestone. Twenty-three rooms. Temple of the Winds columns on the front porch. You know, the place where Elvis lived?"

"The abominable son of Apollo?"

"Yeah, him!" Percy seized the opportunity and actually started to fall into his part. "Couldn't stand to listen to another one of his songs. So I slipped away from the rest of the class. I needed to get to some water so I could think, and get those stupid songs out of my head."

"Oh." It sounded like Poseidon bought it. "Percy, I must ask you to leave Memphis immediately."

"What? Why?"

"I'm sorry about ending your field trip, but Memphis is not safe right now. There are . . . other forces at work. Things you will not have heard of before. They have been inactive so long that I don't think they're even covered in the Camp Halfblood curriculum, but recently they've been rising and gaining more power. Memphis is particularly bad because of all the . . . never mind, that's not important right now."

"Dad . . ." Percy sounded very uncertain.

"It would be best if you returned to New York. They don't hold as much sway there, but still, stay on alert. Avoid Central Park and any museum with ancient history exhibits. It would actually probably be best if you went to Camp Halfblood."

"Dad, what's going on?" asked Percy, like he didn't already know. Or maybe he really didn't know, and was still putting the puzzle together. Everything had fallen into place for Carter immediately; Poseidon was trying to get his son to avoid anything with Egyptian influence, and wanted him amongst his own kind because he'd come to the conclusion that the House of Life was a threat to demigods.

_Or . . ._ a horrible thought occurred to Carter. _Or he thinks that it's the Egyptian gods that are the danger. If the House of Life already turned over Nico and Hades knows Anubis is possessing him. But where does that leave Sadie? Would she have been spared? Does the House of Life have her, or did they, or Hades kill her? No. They couldn't have killed her._ Carter couldn't believe that.

"Percy," said Poseidon in a gentle voice, like waves lapping on sandy white shores, "I'm sorry to have to tell you this but . . ."

Carter could feel his heart pounding against his ribs. Was Poseidon pausing? Why was he pausing? Did he really have to draw out the suspense? What was he going to tell Percy? That the Greeks were going to war with the House of Life or the Egyptian pantheon?

"Dad, what is it?" Percy's voice sounded like he was fighting down hysteria brought on by the suspense as well.

"Your friend Nico . . . he has been abducted by the House of Life. They are a sort of . . . cult that once followed the gods of Egypt."

Percy relaxed slightly, Carter saw, but not enough to cause suspicion.

"After Egypt was conquered by Rome they declared war on their gods and hunted them down."

"And now they have Nico," said Percy grimly. The barely veiled fear and blatant concern weren't an act.

"I'm sorry. I know you two were friends."

_"Were?"_ asked Percy in alarm. "What do you mean _were?"_

"His death has not been confirmed," Poseidon said hastily. "He might yet be alive. Hades has given the House of Life a set time to return his son. If Nico has been killed by them or their gods, or if they refuse to return him, then our pantheon is going to war."

"That . . . would be bad." Coming up with intelligent answers while under pressure didn't seem to be Percy's strongest suit.

"Very bad, for them." Poseidon's voice grew cold, like an arctic undertow. "We are stronger than we have ever been before. The war that you helped us win, and the gift that you demanded from us gods as your reward has actually made us more powerful than we ever knew we could be."

"What? Oh." Percy seemed to figure out whatever confused him. "Hero worship," he said in a somewhat rueful voice. "Literal hero worship." His laugh was tainted with worry. "All kids love their parents . . . or at least, deep down, they want to. Now that they know who they are . . ."

Carter didn't exactly follow what was going on but he wasn't in a good position to ask questions. He was pretty sure that if Poseidon saw him, he would be taken as a member of the House of Life and probably smote down on site.

"Yes . . ." Poseidon sounded a bit awkward. "In return, we are trying to do our best to protect you, all of you, where we can. This threat from the Egyptians will not be let go. There will be no more attempts at taking demigods as hosts for their parasite pantheon." His voice rose in anger, an emotion he was definitely more comfortable with.

"Err . . ."

"Of course," Poseidon settled down. "You do not know the details. I will arrange to have some scrolls sent to you, that will tell you what you need to know of our enemies. Don't worry, you'll be able to read them. They'll be in Ancient Greek."

"Okay . . ."

"And I promise you that I will do everything in my power to save your friend, and that if it is too late for him, he shall be avenged."

"Uh . . . thanks."

"Go now," ordered Poseidon. "Return to camp. It is probably the safest place for demigods right now, but even there do not let your guard down. If war is upon us they may try to strike you there. Be ready. And be careful."

"Yes, my lord." Percy bowed, which seemed weird to Carter. Bowing to his own father. A moment later he straightened and turned to Carter. "Did you get all that?" he asked, moving away from the water.

"Yeah . . ."

"The House of Life hasn't turned over Nico yet. Hades doesn't know he's possessed yet. There's still time to save him and Sadie."

"But then what?" asked Carter. "I don't see any way out of this. Either we get Nico and Sadie back, and Hades declares war on the House of Life, or we don't get them back, Hades realizes what Nico is, Sadie almost certainly dies, and Hades declares war on the Egyptian pantheon. I don't see any way to stop this. There's no third choice. No way to separate Nico and Anubis, no way to trick Hades into not realizing he's possessed, no way to stop him from starting a war –"

"Nico did have some sort of plan," Percy reminded him.

"What? He did? What plan?"

"He didn't say," said Percy. "He just mentioned there was one thing that he could think of, but that it was ridiculous or something like that. The last time he came up with a plan like that . . . well it was really rocky, but it ended up saving the entire world. Whatever he's thought up this time, it might be our only option."

"You're really going to have to tell me about this sometime," said Carter. "It sounds like you guys have done all kinds of cool, heroic stuff."

"I guess," said Percy, "but we're running out of time to save your sister and my cousin, so that'll have to wait. Come on."

* * *

The spell that Carter cast made Percy seasick; something Percy had thought that he was completely immune to. Or maybe, he told himself, it was motion-sickness rather than seasickness. Or magic-sickness. Yes, that had to be it. The sea god's son wouldn't get seasick.

But the spell made his head spin, and made him feel like throwing up. The water beneath their boat was the only constant. Everything else blurred into everything else. Percy saw half the world pass them by, or maybe that was just a hallucination brought on by the magic. Whatever it was, he decided that Greek and Egyptian powers really should not be mixed.

"Are you okay?" asked Carter once all the trippy images disappeared and a desert scene took their place. "You look kind of green."

"That spell is not good," answered Percy, kneading his face with the heels of his hands. "I think I'm going to throw up."

"Err, sorry," apologized Carter. "I thought you'd be okay traveling like this."

"I'm just glad we didn't go the other way," groaned Percy. "I probably would end up diffused into molecules and spread across the globe, and I doubt my invulnerability would have made a bit of difference."

"Invulnerability?"

"Long story." Percy kept his eyes covered and tried to will his nausea way. He needed a focus, something to give him a purpose and a definite reason to drive the sickness away. In his mind he tried to picture Nico. His cousin was the priority. That's why he was here. _Focus, _he told himself._ My cousin needs saving._

"Someday, if we make it through this, and if you're allowed, I really do want to hear all these stories," Carter told him. "I've heard you and Nico reference a lot of different things and it sounds like . . . well, like you guys really are heroes."

"We try," Percy told him. He opened his eyes and forced himself to look around. The desert scene was still in place, which meant they had probably arrived in Egypt_. I'm on the Nile . . . I never thought I'd ever visit this place, yet here I am, in a magic boat, disobeying a direct order from my father, trying to stop a war between the gods, again, and find a son of Hades before that damn kidnapping cult ransoms him back to his father. Damn you Fates!_

He sighed. "We're taking a different way home, by the way," he told Carter. "I miss Nico and his shadow traveling."

"We'll get him back." Carter's eyes were hard with determination now. "Both of them. We have to."

"We will." Percy shook his head to try to clear the last remnants of nausea. A familiar figure came into focus when he finally stopped. "Over there," he told Carter. "Looks like we have a welcoming party."

Bast stood on the river bank, dressed in some sort of robe that looked like appropriate garb for the desert, that would hopefully help her blend in. Percy was just going to have to hope that tourists were popular in the First Nome because he was pretty sure his jeans and bright orange t-shirt were going to stand out.

"I've found where they're keeping them," Bast told Percy and Carter as soon as their boat was within speaking range. "I couldn't get into the building but they're definitely inside. But security is tight. Sneaking in will be difficult. Forcing our way in would probably be impossible."

"What if we shape-shift?" Carter asked. "At least you and me. Maybe we could turn Percy into something too. Nothing bad," he added hastily, when he saw the look Percy gave him. "A bird like I'm planning to be. Or a fruit bat. I've turned people into fruit bats before."

"You're not turning me into a rodent," growled Percy. "I don't even think it would work on me."

"Demigods can be transfigured," Bast told him.

"I know." Percy remembered the guinea pig incident quite clearly, but he didn't think shape-shifting spells would work on him anymore since he had the Curse of Achilles. He was invulnerable to just about everything now. But he wasn't quite ready to share that with his new allies. "I'm a little bit different," was all he told them. "There's a lot of offensive magic that won't work on me."

He tried to think of some way he could contribute, but kept coming up with blanks.

"I'll get you to the building," said Bast. "You can take a look at it. Maybe you'll be able to figure out something once you've seen it."

It was the only plan they had, so Percy nodded. Hopefully there would be something he could use to his advantage there . . . anything . . . He refused to give up. Loyalty to his friends may have been his fatal flaw, but it hadn't killed him yet, and it had saved his friends quite a few times, so he'd take it. If it was a flaw then it wasn't a bad one to have at all.

* * *

Time passed. Nico wasn't sure how much. It was all kind of blurry, but later he had a vague recollection of Sadie waking him and making him put food in his mouth, or shoving it in there for him when he wasn't awake enough to feed himself.

What he would remember most was the warmth though. Their cell wasn't cold, but it was cool, like a cave or a crypt. Nico always felt chilled now, except on the hottest days of summer. He dealt with it by wearing a jacket, did his best to ignore it when it was too inconvenient, and had gotten used to it to the point where it only bothered him when he was weakened and exhausted. At those times it made it hard for him to rest, while his body shivered in a vain attempt to warm itself. But in that cell, even without his jacket, the chill stayed at bay. Sadie kept an arm flung over him and curled up close by his side, keeping him warm.

Slowly, awareness set in and Nico woke up enough to realize he was awake. He felt strong again. Not as strong as he usually was, but well enough to fight. "Sadie?"

Sadie, who must have been napping too, opened her eyes. "Huh? Oh, hey. Feeling any better yet, Death Boy?"

"Yes." Nico detached himself from her and sat up.

_Welcome back,_ said Anubis in his head.

_Was I asleep for long?_

_ Long enough. You remember everything that happened?_

_ Yeah. You know I do._ Nico turned to Sadie who was trying to finger-comb her hair. "You got that collar off me," he said to her. "You saved me."

"I guess we're even now," said Sadie, "for that concussion I gave you when we first met."

Nico flexed his fingers then rotated his shoulders, making sure everything was still in working order. "Jailbreak time?" he asked.

"I was waiting until you woke up to come up with a plan," Sadie told him. "Mainly because I have no ideas, so that was just a convenient excuse."

"Plan?" asked Nico. "We need a plan?"

_Plans are generally a good idea, _Anubis said to him.

"Yeah, a plan," said Sadie. "First for getting out of this cell, then for getting out of the building. I've thought about one of us pretending to be sick, and then both of us attacking whoever checks on us, but so far all the guards who've come by are shabti-"

"What?"

"Shabti . . . fake people created by magic to be servants," explained Sadie. "Or to do a specific task. In this case, to keep us in this cell. They've brought food twice but haven't responded to anything I've said."

"How hard are they to kill?" Nico wanted to know.

"If they're made by someone skilled then they're not pushovers. And these were made by someone skilled. Don't you know you're the House of Life's public enemy number one now?" Sadie smirked. "That spot used to be occupied by moi. Carter was number two."

Nico sighed, wishing that he had his jacket. He'd left his sword in its pocket, in switchblade form. Pretty sure that it was just wishful thinking, he put his hands in his jeans pockets, checking just to make sure. Then his eyes widened as he realized that somehow, someway, his switchblade had returned to him. He pulled it out of his pocket and gave his most devious grin. "Time to see how shabtis like Stygian Iron."

"Unless that thing can cut through regular iron it's not going to do us much good," said Sadie. "We're stuck in here."

Anubis, on the other hand, saw Nico's intents in his thoughts and voiced his approval. _Clever. A bit reckless, but you have no other options._

"We're not stuck in here," Nico told her. He opened his switchblade, turning it into its sword form, and then put his hand against the blade. "By the way, don't ever touch my weapons," he warned his new friend. "Only children of the underworld can stand being cut by Stygian Iron. Everyone else, it devours their life force." Then he pressed his hand against the blade harder and moved it along the razored edge, opening a good sized gash in his palm.

"What are you doing?" asked Sadie. Then, as black blood welled up in his palm she smacked her own forehead. "Why didn't I think of that?"

Nico slicked his blood against the bottom of one of the iron bars of their cell, then glanced at Sadie. "Do you have a weapon?"

"No." Sadie scowled. "They took my entire kit. Damn klepto House of Life freaks."

Nico reached above his head and smeared his blood higher up on the bar then waited for it to melt through the iron. It didn't take long. Less than half a minute later he was able to pull it free, with his uncut hand. He held it out to Sadie. "Now you have a metal stick."

"Gee, Nico," said Sadie, accepting the weapon, "you sure know how to charm a girl."

"Will that work as a staff?" he asked. "If it's too heavy I can burn it in half."

"No, it's fine," Sadie assured him. "Let's get out of here."

Nico started to step through the gap made by the missing bar, but Sadie shoved past him with a smirk.

"Ladies first," she said.

Nico opened his mouth to reply but before he could say anything shouts echoed from above. Nico would have sworn that he heard a sound like roaring waves. He and Sadie looked at each other.

"Trouble?" she asked.

_Sounds like it,_ Anubis said.

"I think so," Nico agreed.

"Well then," Sadie smiled in a very bloodthirsty way. "Let's make it double."

"Is now really the time to be making up nursery rhymes?" Nico asked, stepping out of the cell and starting down the hall. He got past Sadie while she was off guard and took the lead.

"Don't think I won't give you another concussion, Death Boy," threatened Sadie as she ran behind him.

They reached the first set of shabti whose backs were turned to them. One slice of Nico's Stygian Iron blade took off both their heads. A second slice went through one's elbow, then into its chest, then through its other elbow, severing both arms as well as its torso. Meanwhile Sadie smashed her metal stick into the other one. Hieroglyphics glowed in the air around her and the rest of the headless shabti turned to dust.

"Not pushovers?" Nico asked Sadie as he walked over top of the Shabti he'd taken down. It crunched like clods of dirt under his stocking clad feet. He turned the corner and drew up short. Blocking the hall in front of them were no less than a dozen more of shabti.

"Great job, Death Boy," groused Sadie. "You know it's because you said that, that they're here."

"Good." Nico raised his sword again. "I feel like destroying something else."

And he really did. The past week was starting to catch up with him. All the pain and fear that had worn him down, all the worrying, and the stress, and frustration. He needed an outlet for it. Destroying a bunch of clay dolls seemed like a good start. Fueled by his emotions, he surged forward.

"What? Hey! You can't just charge –" Sadie's protest died as she saw that Nico could just charge into a dozen shabti and start cutting them up like cabbages. He was the son of Hades. When he was able to put up a fight, he made sure to put up a hell of a fight, and as the son of one of the Big Three, that came quite naturally to him.

Iron sliced, shabti crumbled and exploded in showers of hieroglyphics as Sadie joined the fight. Minutes later all of the shabti were in ruins and a thin layer of sweat coated Nico's brow. He wiped it away quickly before Sadie could see, but Anubis, in his head, was not so easy to hide it from.

_Don't overdo it, Nico, _the death god cautioned him_._

_ I won't, _Nico thought back_. I'm fine now._

_ You are not._

_ Am too._

_ Are not._

_ Am too!_

"Well," said Sadie, "that was a nice workout." She pushed past Nico with a confident smile. "Shall we . . ." she trailed off as the sound of running footsteps was heard from around the next corner. A wicked smile crested her face as she raised her iron bar, then as the new attacker rounded the bend she swung it with all of her considerable strength.

She nailed Percy right in the head, and invulnerable he may have been, but the momentum was still great enough to slam him into the wall then bounce him right off it again, like a ball in a game of pool. He staggered as he got his balance back.

"Ohmygod!" Sadie said all three words so fast they might as well have been one. "Percy, I'm –"

"Oh, hi Percy," Nico spoke over Sadie casually, as though nothing had happened. He was the one wearing the wicked smile now. "What's going on?"

* * *

Finally finished w. Chap 11! Sorry that took awhile. My surgery went well but the meds they gave me mess up my head. Had to go back about 30 x b/c things I wrote didn't make sense when I reread them. But some good news: my bitch rival got cut and didn't make the JV team! One of the younger girls I was helping out w. her ball skills at camp used her cellphone and got a video of her confessing that she'd smashed my hand on purpose, then showed it to all the other girls, who told the coaches they didn't trust her and wouldn't play on her team. And lets face it, maiming one of your potential teammates doesn't make you a very good team player.

This story's nearing its end, but there's still a few chaps left. Next time: Percy becomes a celebrity to tiger fish and Nico and Sadie make their great escape! And probably not next chapter, but soon, Nico's plan for tricking his dad about his possession situation will be revealed, and it will make his idea about Percy swimming in the Styx look like a safety-first textbook-drill. Please review


	12. Chapter 12

Sorry for the long wait between chapters. I've been out of town most of the past few weeks, only back for a day or two at a time. But here it is: Chapter 12

* * *

The First Nome was completely different than what Percy had expected, not that he knew what to expect at all. He had been thinking something along the lines of a bunch of tents in the desert, or maybe something like one of the cities in _Prince of Persia_. A giant underground cavern brimming with people and all signs of life including water weren't what he expected at all.

"You didn't tell me there was an underground river here," said Percy softly to Carter. He was in a disguise that Bast must have stolen for him and consisted of a nondescript, homespun shirt and pants.

Carter's disguise was much like Percy's, but contained a burnoose to help hide his face. Carter had done something with their normal clothes, stashed them in his Duat locker, which as far as Percy could tell was a pocket in the air. He just hoped the other boy could get them out again when they needed them, because he didn't want to be stuck wearing such ugly threads any longer than he had to be.

"I forgot," Carter told him. "I was worrying about other things."

"A river is good," said Percy. "I can use a river."

"We also might be able to use it to escape," said Carter. "I know the spell makes you sick but it probably is the fastest way out of here."

"Unless Nico can shadow travel us."

"Don't count on that," cautioned Carter. "We don't know what sort of state we'll find them in."

"Nico's too valuable for them to risk killing."

"Or escaping," said Carter. "If it was me, I'd sedate him."

He was right, Percy knew, but didn't want to admit it. But as much as he didn't want to be subject to the river spell again, he was more concerned about putting Nico through it. What if he'd only survived it because he had the Curse of Achilles? What if it somehow unbalanced whatever powers Nico was managing to keep in alignment inside of himself and destroyed him? What if it left him curled up and crying in pain like just about every other freaky Egyptian thing seemed to be doing to him?

They followed Bast, who wove her way through the crowd in her cat shape. She led them over a bridge but Percy paused midway across.

"There are fish in here."

"Tiger fish," said Carter, softly. "They're like piranhas but bigger. Maybe you should rethink using the river in your strategy.

_Son of the sea god! Son of the sea god!_

It seemed that tiger fish liked Percy just as much as regular fish liked him.

"Or maybe it's exactly what we need," said Percy then sent his thoughts to the fish. _Hey guys? What's up?_

_ Son of the sea god!_

_ He's talking to us!_

_ Someone answer him!_

_ Hi!_

_ Hi!_

_ Hi!_

_ He asked us a question! _

_ He asked what is up._

_ The surface! The surface of the water is up!_

"What are you doing?" asked Carter.

"Making some new friends."

_Friends! He wants to be friends!_

_ The son of the sea god wants to be our friend!_

"Percy . . . are you sure that's a good idea?"

Percy nodded. "Sure it is. These guys are nice."

_He thinks we're nice! _

_ The son of the sea god thinks we're nice!_

"Did you miss the part where I said they're like piranhas?" asked Carter, looking pale.

"Carter," Percy told him, "trust me. These guys are nothing like piranhas. In fact, I'm pretty sure these guys would put piranhas to shame."

_Yes! We would!_

_ Piranhas ain't got nothing on us!_

_ What's a piranha?_

_ Who cares? We're better than them!_

Carter looked down at the tiger fish fearfully then sighed. "What are you planning to do?"

"I'm going to raise the water level," Percy told him. "Flood this place. That should be a good enough distraction, don't you think? And it'll give my new friends here a chance to eat. They look a little underfed and there was plenty of delicious looking meat cooking in the open air market."

"But won't they go after people?" asked Carter.

"Why would they go after people when they can get nice cooked meat?"

_Yeah, who'd want to eat people?_

_ Cooked meat! _

_ The son of the sea god is giving us access to cooked meat!_

_That was surprisingly simple,_ Percy thought to himself then projected to his new friends. _Hang on for a few minutes, guys. I just need to find out where my cousin is before I raise the water. He's not feeling good so I've come to take him home._

_ The son of the sea god's such a nice guy._

_ Why are all the good ones demigods?_

_ Even if the son of the sea god was a fish, he'd like me better._

_ Would not!_

"Mrrrouw!" Bast had returned to the bridge to see what the hold-up was, but it became apparent that she could understand what the tiger fish were saying when her spine arched and all her hair started to stand on end.

"Sorry," Percy told her, but really wasn't very sorry. Getting wet was a small price to pay for getting Nico and Sadie back. "Can you show me where they're keeping my cousin?" he asked, even though Bast was in the process of doing that already. He wanted the fish to have more information. "I'm kind of worried about him, and worried that someone might try to stop me from taking him home."

_Someone's trying to stop the son of the sea god?_

_ Who do they think they are?_

_ We'll stop them from stopping him!_

_ Don't worry son of the sea god. If anyone tries to stop you taking your cousin home-_

_ Bite! Bite! Bite!_

_Thanks guys, _Percy telepathed to them then continued on after Bast.

"So," said Carter after they were off the bridge, "you can talk to fish?"

The building where Nico and Sadie were being held was conveniently quite close to the river. Not right off the bank or anything, but close enough that Percy was able to control it from right in front of the building.

"If we're going to be working together, maybe I should learn some water spells," said Carter.

"That might be helpful," admitted Percy as he felt for the power of the river. "Too bad none of my demigod friends are capable of learning anything of the sort."

"Nico should be able to learn whatever Sadie and I can learn," pointed out Carter.

"Huh, good point, but I need quiet for a minute. This is going to take some concentration."

"Okay. Sorry."

Percy closed his eyes and pulled at the river's source. Or maybe not the direct source, but at the water that was in reserve, waiting to come through. A hard yank and a major adjustment to the water pressure and boom! Suddenly the river was overflowing.

People screamed and started running frantically, trying to get out of the way. They spoke panickedly in languages that Percy wasn't familiar with, and so he couldn't understand them, but he was pretty sure that at least one person mentioned his new friends the tiger fish.

Within a mere half minute the water level had risen twenty feet past the banks of the river and was rising higher with every second. He redirected a thick beam of it and used it to blast down the doors to the building where Nico and Sadie were being held, and also blast down the shabti guards who stood in front of those doors. The artificial people broke apart under the water pressure. Percy was glad that the House of Life was relying so heavily on those quasi-automaton things as their guards. It meant that he wouldn't have to risk hurting as many real people breaking Nico and Sadie out.

Percy, Carter, and Bast stormed into the building, Bast in human shape again. They cut down shabti after shabti inside the halls and didn't come across a single human.

"You two go downstairs," ordered Bast once they found the staircase. "That's where they're most likely to have Sadie and Nico. I'll clear out anymore shabti that are up here, and hold off any magicians."

Percy nodded and immediately charged down the stairs, taking them two at a time.

"Be careful, Bast," said Carter before following.

Percy turned several more shabti into dust, rounded a corner, and then –

WHAM!

What felt like a metal pipe, or maybe a baseball bat, slammed into the side of his head, hard enough to smash a cantaloupe. Never before had he been so glad to be invulnerable. If he wasn't, he was pretty sure his skull and brains would resemble a watermelon after being dropped off a four story balcony.

"Ohmygod!" said Sadie, horrified to realize she'd just brained her ally. "Percy, I'm –"

"Oh, hi Percy," said Nico, wearing a smile that was pure evil, even on his angel's face. He spoke casually, as though they'd just run into each other in a grocery store, or some common hangout. "What's going on?"

"Sadie! Are you okay?" Carter shoved past Percy, unaware of what just happened.

Sadie stepped back, panicking, like she was afraid of physical contact. "I'm fine, Carter! Gosh, don't get so dramatic about it."

"Are you okay, Nico?" asked Percy, shelving the metal pipe incident, at least for the moment. He gave his cousin a cursory inspection. Nico looked pale, as always, and there were dark circles under his eyes, like he was tired. But there was also that spark of good humor in his eyes. It was obvious that he'd been worn down, but he hadn't been broken.

"I'm okay," Nico told him. He stepped around Sadie and Carter to stand closer to his cousin. "Let's just get out of here Percy," he said, a little bit of desperation creeping into his voice. "I want to go home."

Percy wasn't sure where Nico meant when he said 'home' but he nodded anyway. "We're going home," he promised, grabbing his cousin by the shoulder and steering him back toward the stairs.

Of course, it was a lot easier to say they were going than to actually get there. They met more opposition after joining up with Bast, on their way out of the building. Several magicians had come running. Sadie and Carter jumped to the forefront to trade spells with them. Percy kept Nico shielded behind him and used his hydrokinetic powers to control all the water that was conveniently everywhere now. He swamped the magicians, knocking them off their feet and breaking their concentration, then he gave the current an extra boost so that it swept their weapons away from them.

"Get the boat!" he shouted at Carter.

"I'm working on it!" replied Carter. "It's not as easy as it looks, especially since this isn't where the river's really supposed to be."

"Going somewhere, pet?" asked a familiar voice from above them.

Immediately, they all looked up, to the roof of the building beside the one they'd just busted out of, and saw Aziza the sadistic psychopath leering down at them, or more specifically, at Nico. Out the corner of his eye, Percy saw Nico go even paler at the sight of his nemesis.

"Back off!" Percy shouted at her. "We're leaving. I'm taking my cousin home, and if you try to stop us you're going to regret it."

"You're not going anywhere," growled Aziza. She pointed her staff at them and said a few words that Percy couldn't understand. Hieroglyphics glowed around her, and a giant snake appeared out of thin air and flew right at Percy.

He moved forward to meet it, sword first, and lopped off its head then sidestepped its flying carcass. "Is that all you've got?" he asked.

"Not even close, you foolish demigod," crowed Aziza. "Who do you think you're fighting?"

"A crazy kidnapping hag who started this whole mess in the first place!" Percy told her. "It's thanks to you that Hades is about to declare war on the House of Life you know."

"Liar!"

"What, you think Hades is about to declare war on you because he's bored?" demanded Percy. "You attacked and almost killed his son, and it's only thanks to these two that you didn't kill him." Percy motioned toward Sadie and Carter. "They took him and hid him from you, a little too well, since Hades couldn't find him either and thought he'd been kidnapped, but instead of sending someone to try to work things out peacefully you decided to kidnap him for real! You brought this on yourself!"

Fury had been building in Percy as he yelled at Aziza, finally getting a chance to voice what he thought about her, and put the blame for this whole mess where it belonged. If Aziza hadn't been such a sadistic bitch, if she and her friend hadn't woken up and decided to go kill a couple of kids they disagreed with in Central Park, none of them would be in this mess now. It was their fault that Nico had almost died, and that now the world had to deal with another doomsday prophecy that was starting to shape up.

With a scream, Percy sent a wall of water, at least forty feet high, slamming down on Aziza, knocking her from her rooftop perch, down into the overflowing river.

_The son of the sea god is mad!_

_ He's mad at that woman!_

_ She's trying to stop the son of the sea god taking his cousin home!_

_ Get her!_

_ Bite! Bite! Bite! Bite! Bite!_

Tiger fish swarmed Aziza and her shrill screams echoed throughout the First Nome.

"Got it!"

Percy turned to see Carter, standing in the waist-deep water, holding the boat he'd summoned steady while Sadie climbed into it. Bast was already in it, looking banefully at the water. She was already soaked and none too happy about it.

"Let's go," he told his cousin and turned to Nico. He frowned, seeing that Nico appeared frozen, just staring at Aziza who was thrashing in the water, trying to fend off Percy's friends the tiger fish. "Nico! Come on!"

Nico started then looked at Percy blankly.

"We're leaving!" Percy grabbed him by one arm and half drug the shell-shocked boy to the boat. Sadie and Bast reached over the side and helped pull him in. Percy and Carter both jumped in as well. "Alright, Mr. Wizard, get us out of here," Percy said to Carter. He braced himself as Carter began working his magic and everything started to go blurry that wasn't inside the boat. Nausea started to set in for the demigod, and he figured that he was probably turning green again.

"Percy?" asked Nico in a small voice.

"It's okay, Nico," said Percy, figuring that his cousin was being affected the same way that he was. "It'll pass."

Thick trees, like in a jungle, and pink river dolphins blinked in and out around the boat, then the scene seemed to melt into what looked like a rice paddy, then finally, the familiar hustle and bustle of New York City.

"Percy!" said Nico urgently.

"It's alright, it's almost over," croaked Percy. "You'll be alright. I promise."

"It's not me that I'm worried about!" said Nico. "You look like you're going to puke!"

Percy looked slowly at his cousin and was mildly surprised to see that Nico didn't look any worse now than he had when he'd gotten into the boat.

"Are you . . . sea-sick?" asked Nico hesitantly.

"Not sea-sick," Percy told him, burying his face in one hand. "Magic-sick. You don't have it?"

"Uh uh."

"How is that possible?" wondered Percy.

"You're sure you're not just sea-sick?"

"I'm the son of the sea god!" said Percy, very annoyed now. "I don't get sea-sick!"

"Motion-sick then?"

"No," said Percy. "I'm pretty sure that it's from their screwed up Egyptian magic, combined with the fact that I'm a demigod. Or at least I would be sure, if you were affected the same way . . ."

Nico cocked his head to one side as though he was listening to someone. "Anubis thinks you're probably right," he said seconds later. "He just thinks that I've adapted to the Egyptian magic inside of me now, which is why I'm not affected."

Percy tried to glare at his cousin, especially at the mischievous look in his eyes, but it was hard to both glare and keep himself from throwing up.

"The son of the sea god gets sea-sick," cackled Sadie, safely at the other end of the boat. "That's rich."

"Both of you shut up," Percy told them, feeling even more miserable. The moment Carter pulled the boat up to the bank, near the Kanes' mansion, he rolled out of it and onto the sidewalk, and closed his eyes, trying to fight off that sickening feeling.

Something icy cold pressed against both of his temples and cheeks. He cracked his eyes open and saw Nico looking at him, seemingly upside down. The boy knelt above Percy's head and framed Percy's face with his hands.

"Coldness helps sometimes," said Nico by way of explanation. He looked a little bit embarrassed but didn't pull away. "When you're feeling sick. Having something cold on your circulation points . . . And everyone says my hands are as cold as death . . ."

Strange as it seemed, the iciness actually did help. Almost immediately Percy began to feel better.

"Thanks, Nico," he said a minute later, as Nico's cold touch chased away the last of the magic-sickness. "That's a lot better." He sat up and Nico withdrew his hands. "Where did you learn that?" he asked, curious. "Putting something cold on circulation points?"

Nico opened his mouth to answer, then his face went blank. "I don't remember," he muttered.

"It kind of sounds like a mom thing to say," Percy told him and watched his cousin's reaction carefully.

"Maybe . . ." Nico looked confused. Not upset or frustrated, but maybe a little sad.

Percy was hesitant to say anything about it yet, but there were times when he had the feeling that Nico's Lethe washed memories weren't as far gone as they'd all assumed they were. Every now and then there would be some little thing that made him wonder if more had been left in Nico's memory than there should have been, like the way he started speaking Italian when he was tired, or cursing in Italian when he was enraged . . . and the way he'd recognized his mother's face that time when he, Percy, and Thalia were retrieving the Sword of Hades. It was only speculation, though, and he didn't want to give Nico false hope yet, but he intended to keep an eye on this and see what came of it.

"Well, it works," said Percy, to distract Nico from his missing memories. "Thank you, Nico."

Nico's mouth twisted wryly. "I should probably be the one thanking you."

"Yes, yes, very touching," said Sadie, "but it would probably be a good idea to get inside and fix the wards before our House of Life friends descend upon us again, and try to re-kidnap you."

"Is this really the best place to be?" asked Percy as he stood up, accepting the hand Nico offered to help him. "They'll look for you here."

Carter frowned. "We have nowhere else to go."

"Actually, we do," Percy told them.

Nico looked anxious. "I don't think taking them to Camp Half-blood's a good idea, Percy. Even if they can get past the defenses and don't get pwned, there's still –"

"I actually wasn't talking about Camp Half-blood," Percy told them.

* * *

Sadie was surprised how readily Mrs. Jackson, or Sally as she insisted on being called, opened her home to the three kids and the cat that her son brought home. They all looked like they'd been drug through a gutter, with their clothes stained from blood, dust and river water, their hair still damp, all of them dragging their feet with every step.

"Friends from camp?" she asked as they all collapsed into chairs around the kitchen table.

"Not exactly," answered Percy. "Mom, meet Sadie Kane and Carter Kane. They're . . . not demigods. They're Egyptian magicians."

Sadie was a bit surprised that Sally didn't even bat an eye or look the slightest bit curious to learn Sadie and Carter had the same last name. She wondered if that confusion would come later, when Sally learned the Kanes were full siblings, not cousins like she probably suspected, or maybe half-siblings like she was probably used to, from Percy's demigod friends.

"Nice to meet you."

"You too," said Sadie. "Bloody lovely."

"Sadie," hissed Carter. "Be polite."

"I was."

"Nico, are you alright?" Sally moved to the smallest of their group and put a hand against his forehead in a very motherly way.

"Mom," said Percy, "you know he doesn't have a fever."

"Of course I know." Sally moved behind Nico and put her hands on his shoulders in a kind of protective manner. "And you know that it doesn't matter. I'll treat my nephew the same way I'd treat any little boy I thought might be ill."

Sadie smirked at the look that crossed Nico's face, like he didn't know whether to be touched or terrified or both. She decided to help him out a bit by directing Sally's attention away from him. "Actually, Percy was the one who got sea-sick on the way back to New York. You might want to check him out."

Sally looked alarmed. "Sea-sick?"

"No, I was not sea-sick," growled Percy. "Their Egyptian magic just made me a little nauseous, that's all."

"He almost puked all over Nico," said Sadie helpfully.

"No he didn't," said Carter. "Stop exaggerating, Sadie."

"You know that I'm fine, Mom," said Percy, trying to fend off his mother's forehead attack on him. "You know I am. I'm invincible, remember? Mom, stop it . . ."

"You're not invincible," said Sally. "Don't start thinking like that, Percy."

Percy flushed. "I won't, I didn't mean it like that. I meant I'm almost completely, physically invulnerable. I'm not sick and I don't have a fever."

It took a few moments to assuage Sally, and Sadie had to wonder just what they were talking about. Obviously there was a story behind Percy thinking he was invincible. In time she could probably get it out of Nico, or if not him, she could probably wheedle Anubis into picking it out of his brain and telling her, but there'd be time for that later.

"Well, I'm glad you're home," said Sally at last. "Does this mean that everything's all right now?"

"Er, not exactly . . ." the four of them exchanged glances. "We still have a few things to take care of," Percy told his Mom. "It will all be alright soon."

Sadie hoped that meant Percy had a plan. In fact, she actually thought that he must, because he sounded so convincing, and she didn't take him for being a good liar. It wasn't until after enjoying the meal that Mrs. Jackson served them, then retreating into Percy's room to talk that she learned otherwise.

"Well, Nico," said Percy, "we're running out of time. Since I don't think it's even possible to separate you and Anubis at this point, or at least not on this time frame, we're going to have to go with your crazy plan."

"You didn't come up with a plan?" demanded Sadie. "Your plan is to have your cousin come up with a plan?"

"I don't think you'll want to use my plan," said Nico. "It's . . . not a good plan."

"Neither was our trip to the Styx, but that turned out well enough in the end."

"You went to the River Styx?" asked Carter.

Percy nodded. "If we live through the week, I'll tell you about it."

"Did you ride the ferry?" Carter wanted to know. "Did you have to pay those coins?"

"Brother? Focus, please," said Sadie. "It's potentially the end of the world we're discussing here. Less tangents."

"Nico," said Percy, "your plan is all we've got. None of the rest of us has a clue what to do or how to fool Hades."

Nico shook his head. "You're not going to like it. You're going to think that it's crazy."

"I'm sure I will," said Percy, "but I trust you. If you think it could work then we might as well give it a shot. It's the only chance we've got now."

Sadie watched, bemused, as Nico mouthed the word 'trust' at his cousin, with a bug-eyed look on his face. She glanced at Percy just in time to see the older teen nod, then back at Nico in time to see him sit up a bit straighter, suddenly looking nervous.

Then Nico began to explain his plan, and Sadie realized why he looked so nervous. His plan was possibly the most ridiculous thing she'd ever heard. Apparently Percy agreed.

"Nico," he said, "I'm sorry, but I take it back. That is completely insane."

"I know," said Nico morosely. "But like you said, it might be the only chance we've got now. I wouldn't have even said anything about it if there was another option, but there's not."

And he was right. The deadline was close. Too close. And Sadie couldn't think of anything that they could possibly do to stop Hades from going on a rampage. Anything except what Nico proposed.

With a groan, she closed her eyes and muttered, "We're all going to die."

* * *

Next Chapter: Nico's plan is revealed, and you too will probably think that he's crazy. I'll get it posted as soon as I can. I also need to work on my Artemis Fowl fic that's been on hiatus most of the summer . . . but I realized that I get too confused working on 2 long stories at the same time, and since more people are reading and reviewing this one, I'm giving it priority.


	13. Chapter 13

Wow, people seemed to really like the tiger-fish, lol. I was worried people would think they were cheesy or annoying, but everyone seemed to like them so much that they'll definitely have to come back in another story. Thank you for letting me know how much you liked them so I know what to put more of in during future stories.

Also, thank you whoever nominated this fic for a Veritas Award. That came as a huge surprise, but a nice one!

* * *

13

They shadow traveled to a graveyard outside of New York City, right after the sun set. The graveyard they picked was a big one, but a quiet one that didn't see a lot of traffic. No one wanted any interruptions, after all.

"It has to be set up perfectly," said Nico, grabbing the McDonald's bag that was filled with discarded packaging from various McDonald's foods and setting it so that it was propped against a nearby bench.

Anubis appeared in his human-looking form, right on top of a sarcophagus-style grave and began laying down cards. Nico jumped up, fished out his own deck, and began arranging them as well, trusting Percy to line up the McDonald's toys from the twenty-odd Happy Meals they'd picked up that afternoon. Until he saw the incredibly sloppy job that Percy was doing.

"No, not like that!" he said, hopping back down and storming over, not sure why he was so irrationally angered about it. All he knew was that it was wrong and it bothered him.

"Like what then?" asked Percy.

"Straight," said Nico. "Perfectly straight. Like this." He began rearranging the figures. "Grouped by predominant color, starting with red on the left side, and moving along in the same order that they appear in the color spectrum. Then grouped by relative heights once they've been grouped by color, putting the tallest on the left and working your way down to the shortest. And when you line them up-"

"I'll just let you do it," decided Percy, stepping back.

"OCD much?" asked Sadie.

"I don't know what that means," said Nico impatiently as he began lining up his toys the proper way.

"Obsessive Compulsive Disorder," said Carter.

"I still don't know what that means."

"It's a –"

"He doesn't really care either," said Anubis. The god had finished setting up his half of the Mythomagic game. "Now's really not the time for explanations about psychology either."

"I told you to get out of my head," said Nico. "Or as much out of it as you can. If you can read my thoughts you're in too deep."

He immediately felt Anubis's presence in his mind begin to retreat until only the faintest echo of the god's presence was still there. But he could feel Anubis' power all around him, seeping into the graveyard, saturating every tombstone and statue, and even the earth itself. That kind of power was heady, almost intoxicating. It was also unexpected. Nico didn't think that the Lotus Casino could have had a stronger pull on him than Anubis' power. He felt like he could stay there forever, living only on that raw death energy. He wondered if he was going to have some sort of withdrawl symptom when this was over, but decided it would be worth the extra realism that it added to his plan.

The others' reaction to Anubis' power seeping into everything was very, very different. Percy's expression grew more and more uncomfortable. He could sense the danger he was in. Death radiation wasn't any better for him than it was for anyone else, even if he was invulnerable everywhere except for that one weak spot. A weak spot that Nico as pretty sure he'd figured out where it was, despite the fact that he'd been deliberately trying not to figure it out. The death that the graveyard was radiating wouldn't kill Percy, unless Anubis willed it to, but Percy's instincts still made him want to avoid it and be anywhere else in the world than where he was at that moment.

Carter and Sadie were affected much more drastically. Nico saw their hands start shaking, and they kept looking around kind of fearfully, like they thought something was trying to sneak up on them.

"You should get clear now, Percy," said Nico. He felt a bit guilty about subjecting Percy to this, especially since Percy wasn't needed here for the plan at all. He'd tried to get his cousin to stay behind, but Percy would have none of it, and so he'd brought him along. Just like both of the Kanes, even though they only really needed one of them. At least the stupid cat had stayed behind. Nico wasn't sure if it was a result of having Anubis in his head, or if he would have felt that way anyway, but he couldn't bring himself to really like Bast.

"You're sure you'll be okay?' asked Percy, obstinate as usual.

"No," Nico answered honestly. "But this is the best chance we've got, isn't it? Carter, you should go with him."

"I want to stay," said Carter, but his teeth were chattering together and he was shaking like he was shivering, even though he was dressed for the cool night.

Sadie was keeping herself together a little bit better, maybe because of their short stint in prison together. Maybe napping beside of him had helped her get some tolerance to the death energy that they were all now literally breathing, because only her hands were shaking, and her scared glances weren't much worse than what any normal twelve-year-old girl would be giving if she was in a strange graveyard in the middle of the night. More than that, Nico found that he actually preferred Sadie to be the one who stayed rather than Carter. Maybe because he had a better idea of how she was likely to act since he'd spent more time with her.

"The more people there are here, the higher the risks are," pointed out Anubis. "Go with Percy, Carter."

Carter only hesitated a few more seconds before he nodded.

"Do you really think this will work?" asked Sadie, once the other boys were gone.

Nico probably would have started to get a headache if not for the fact that he was inhaling pure power. Everyone seemed to want reassurance from him. Reassurance that he couldn't give them. Hades' moods were difficult to predict and he would doublessly be on edge right now.

"All children of Hades start to get a little . . . unhinged as we grow older," Nico told her instead of answering outright. "For some of us it's worse than others. We can use that, and the fact that he knows I'm stupid to our advantage."

"He thinks you're stupid?" asked Sadie hotly. "You're not stupid."

"I've done a lot of stupid things," said Nico. "He knows about most of them. Do the math."

"You're not stupid."

"He thinks I am, and that's what matters," said Nico. "We have to use that. There's no other way that this would work."

Sadie looked like she wanted to argue but knew that they didn't have the time. "Is there anything else I can do to help set up?" she asked instead.

Nico shook his head. "This has to be done perfectly. Every detail has to be right. If he sees even one thing wrong that could ruin everything."

Setting up the toys took longer than anything else, but neither Sadie nor Anubis tried to rush him. Sadie's patience surprised Nico. Anubis's didn't really. The god had seen everything there was to see in his head, after all. He knew how important it was that Nico get it exactly right. Or at least he knew how important it was to Nico that he get it exactly right. He also knew what could happen if Hades saw through their charade.

Finally, everything was set up. Nico stepped away from his toys and hopped back up on top of the sarcophagus.

"And now we play cards," said Anubis, with something very close to a challenge in his voice.

"You better be glad this isn't a real match," Nico told him.

"Why? Because I'd have to hear your pitiful whining in my head once you'd lost?"

"I wouldn't lose," sneered Nico. "Especially not to someone who favors an earth-element offense. What is this crap?" He motioned toward Anubis' set-up.

"This is the deck that I used to school Thoth!"

"You really can't count it as a victory if you play someone when they're tripping on acid."

"He was not-"

"Boys," said Sadie. "Focus?"

Nico and Anubis glowered at each other, and began playing, but not for real. They made the same moves they would have made if they had been playing for real, but both knew that this was a game they wouldn't finish. When Anubis had taken three turns and Nico had taken four, they stopped and put their hands down, face down, as though they had every intention of finishing the game.

"Alright, it's time," said Nico. He tugged on the jackal charm that Anubis had given him before they came, and reminded himself that he needed to fiddle with it during the next and final part of his plan. "Try to look unnerved, Sadie."

"I think I've got that covered," Sadie told him dryly.

"You're ready, Anubis?"

The death god nodded.

Nico took a deep breath then began chanting in Greek to raise a spirit. He needed to send a messenger to his father.

* * *

Hades dropped everything he was doing and shot toward the surface the moment his son's spirit messenger reached him. Call him an over-protective parent, but somehow the message, "I'm fine. You don't need to kill the House of Life. And you don't need to worry about me," didn't set his mind at ease.

Any other being, even Zeus himself, would have needed to take one of the pre-existing exits out of the Underworld. Not Hades. He created a new one that opened up right in the middle of the graveyard from which his son's message had been sent.

He felt a foreign god's power even before he broke through the surface, and drew on the power of the souls he'd collected, preparing for a fight.

And then he actually saw what was in front of him and stopped dead.

His son was perched on top of a sarcophagus-style grave, with Anubis, Egyptian god of death, playing Mythomagic. Or rather they had been playing. Now he was looking at his father with big, shocked eyes, while Anubis, the annoying jackal, leaned over to try to sneak a look at the cards in Nico's hand.

"What is the meaning of this?" roared Hades.

"Um, hello Father," said Nico. He put his cards down face down and slid off the vault grave, then knelt respectfully. "Maybe . . . my messenger wasn't as clear as I meant for him to be, and I'm sorry that you had to come all this way, but . . . I haven't been kidnapped by the House of Life, my lord."

"You, jackal," snarled Hades. "How dare you interfere with my son?"

Anubis stood up but didn't jump off the sarcophagus. He just looked at Hades coldly and crossed his arms over his chest. Hades couldn't help but notice the form he'd taken and the clothes he'd decided to wear. The Egyptian looked like he was trying to pass himself off as Nico's big brother.

"The only one interfering is you, Corpse Breath," Anubis snarled right back. "We were playing Mythomagic."

"So you felt it necessary to block my mental connection to him!"

"You act like I care enough about you to do something like that deliberately," said Anubis. "Feel where you are, Greek. I'm inhabiting this graveyard. Every stone, coffin, grain of dirt, and blade of grass is brimming with my power. And you wonder why your little message did not get through?"

The aura of death was indeed very strong here. If there was to be a fight, Hades would be at a double disadvantage. One because his son was there, and he was not willing to chalk his death up as collateral damage, and two because Anubis had the advantage of the terrain.

Hades grabbed his son roughly by the shoulder and pulled him off the ground and away from the Egyptian god. "You've held my son here for nearly a week and you thought that I would be okay with that?"

"He didn't hold me here against my will, father," said Nico, sounding shocked and frantic. "No one held me anywhere against my will. I've been here with Anubis all week playing Mythomagic!"

Hades looked down and stared at his son incredulously. "What?"

Nico nodded. "We've just been playing Mythomagic. He didn't force me to stay. I was here because I wanted to be."

"You've been here playing that stupid game with the Egyptian god of death for an entire week?" demanded Hades.

"Not quite an entire week . . ." said Nico, his voice squeaking as he obviously grew more and more unsettled. He tugged at something around his neck. A black cord with a jackal silver hieroglyphic hanging from it, that Hades had never seen him wearing before. Power emanated from the charm. Not much, but it was definitely there, and it was definitely Anubis's.

Now Hades was confused. The Egyptian gods did not give their favors lightly. For Anubis to have given an amulet like that to Nico suggested that they were on good terms, which was almost unheard of for demigods and Egyptian gods or magicians. And he'd just noticed something else, a young girl close to Nico's age, dressed in all cotton, behind Anubis, cringing and keeping a tombstone that came up to her waist between them. The girl reaked of Egyptian magic, but not Anubis' death magic. She had the feel of someone from the House of Life.

"Maybe I should explain what happened," said Nico before Hades could question her presence. "I think . . . from what Sadie said . . . it sounded like some things got misinterpreted, but . . . It started a couple days ago. Six days, maybe? I've lost count because these Mythomagic battles have been completely epic, and you wouldn't believe how many times I've pwned Anubis, Dad – Err, I mean, my lord." Nico bowed his head. "Anubis is . . . my friend. We play cards sometimes, and he always loses –"

"No I don't," growled Anubis.

"Well, he wins every now and then, but hardly ever," amended Nico. "But he's still better than any humans or other demigods I've played, so I like playing with him. But six or so days ago, right after I left the Underworld, I came here to meet him, and suddenly these freaks with staffs showed up and wanted to exorcise me or something. They attacked me with a jackal, which I sent to Cerberus as a chew toy, then Anubis showed up and chased them off. Then we started playing cards, and we've been playing ever since, until a couple minutes ago, when Sadie showed up and said you were going to kill the House of Life."

"Since when do House of Life magicians consort with their gods?" asked Hades suspiciously. "Did they not decide they were better off without you and try to kill you all a couple thousand years ago?"

"Sadie is not of the House of Life," said Anubis. Now he got off the sarcophagus and moved to stand defensively between her and Hades. "She is the daughter of the host of Osiris, who was cast out of the House of Life. If you attempt to harm her you will have a war with our entire pantheon on your hands."

"I summoned a ghost and sent him to tell you that you didn't need to kill the House of Life because they don't really have anything to do with . . . well, anything," said Nico quickly, before Hades could make a response to the threat. "They only threw a jackal at me because they thought I was Anubis. They didn't kidnap me or anything. And they sure as heck didn't hurt me." He smirked, like he thought the idea was funny. "Like they could."

"And so you've been here, in this graveyard, playing cards all week?"

"Almost all week."

"I thought you had been kidnapped by the House of Life. I was prepared to start a war to get you back, and now I find that you have been here, playing a game?"

"I didn't know! I'm sorry, lord," said Nico. "If I'd known, I would have sent a message sooner. I'm sorry."

"It's not his fault, Greek," said Anubis. "Don't get mad at him because you're such an alarmist. You see one jackal in your realm and you think the House of Life is invading?" The older death god laughed. "Good job."

"You shut up, Egyptian!" snarled Hades. "This is more your fault than his! You had no right to block my connection to his mind –"

"I didn't do it deliberately!" Anubis puffed up angrily. "I inhabited this graveyard so that we wouldn't have anymore interruptions. Do you know how annoying it is when you're about to pwn a young upstart like your son, but suddenly a caretaker shows up and starts shouting at you to get off the tombstone, or a magician turns up to try to exorcise you? Do you!"

"I don't care how annoying it is! Your power kept my son prisoner here whether he knew it or not! It's so thick that he can't help but breathe it, and it's addled the meager amount of brains he had to begin with!"

Anubis pointed. "He left several times to seek sustenance and returned of his own free will!"

Hades' gaze followed Anubis' finger toward a nearby bench. A McDonald's bag full of trash was leaning up against it. Hades saw crumpled Happy Meal bags, hamburger wrappers, and soda cups about ready to start falling out of it. And lined up on top of the bench, with the sort of meticulousness that only Nico could manage, was an assortment of cheap toys that had come in the Happy Meals. If he hadn't been convinced that Nico had really been there all week, playing cards, he was after seeing that.

"Of course he returned," Hades growled. "It would have only taken him about two breathes in this place to get addicted to all this!"

"He was addicted to Mythomagic long before I met him, Hades," said Anubis. "And I've already taken precautions to make certain that he is not altered or harmed from exposure to my powers."

Hades looked at his son again and looked at the jackal charm he was wearing. So that explained that.

"He did nothing wrong," growled Anubis. "So you should stop acting like he did. Your parenting skills are even worse than my father's, and that's saying something."

"I don't need advice on raising my own children from you, old man!" said Hades angrily.

"I wasn't giving advice. I was just criticizing."

"Umm," interrupted Nico, "I'm sorry but . . . you're not going to make me stop playing with Anubis, are you Father?"

Hades glared down at his son. The sight of Nico's glassy puppy-dog eyes weakened his anger but only fractionally. Minutely, even. Barely at all. "Your amulet will prevent your powers from harming him?" he asked Anubis instead of answering his son.

Anubis nodded. "And you have my word that while he is in any graveyard I am inhabiting, he will be safe from all House of Life freaks and other Egyptian deities and monsters. As well as any Greek monsters or anyone from your pantheon. If anyone other than you had come charging in here while I was inhabiting it, I would have sealed them away in the Duat for half a millennium. But I thought that would have upset my card partner, and his game really can't afford anymore distractions."

Nico looked irate. "Why you-"

"Silence," Hades ordered his son. He stared at the boy, then at the other death god for a moment, then back to Nico. He sighed. "You can keep . . . _playing_ with your . . . _friend_." Hades felt incredibly ridiculous saying this. It was the sort of thing he'd never expected to be saying and it made him feel like a character on some family sitcom. And then there was the fact that the _friend_ he was giving his son permission to play with was a god even older than Hades himself. "Just . . . know that if you harm him, jackal, there will be war."

Anubis nodded curtly.

Hades looked to his son again and sighed. Only Nico would be so young and foolish that he'd spend an entire week in a graveyard, playing Mythomagic with an Egyptian death god. He almost couldn't believe it. If it was anyone else, he wouldn't have believed it. But it was Nico. Foolish, naïve Nico.

It wasn't in Hades' nature at all to look on the bright side, but he knew that this could have turned out much worse. If what he'd feared had really been true, then the Greek pantheon would have been going to war with the House of Life. Or, if Nico was as demented as Hades' last son, he could have been off figuring out how to stir up World War III on his own, instead of playing Mythomagic with a . . . fairly responsible . . . pseudo-adult.

Hades sighed and gave his son his usual parting instructions. Don't take any crap from the Ares Cabin, don't let gods-damned Percy Jackson show you up, and don't you dare come back home to the Underworld without your body, because if you get yourself killed I will be very disappointed in you, was the gist of what he had to say. Then he left, because he had a war to call off, some excuses to make to his fellow gods, and an irate wife to deal with.

* * *

Nico slumped to the ground and leaned his back against a giant tombstone, feeling mentally exhausted. Being in his father's presence was always tiring. Deliberately lying to him took just about everything he had.

Anubis sat down beside him and leaned back against the tombstone as well. "That went . . . perfectly."

"Yeah," said Nico. "I can't believe it."

Sadie moved to stand in front of them but didn't slouch down against a headstone like they were. "So it worked?" she asked, sounding like she couldn't believe it either. "He really bought it?"

Nico nodded. "He thinks I'm crazy enough to spend an entire week doing nothing but playing Mythomagic in a graveyard, with a death god."

"Aren't you?" teased Anubis.

"I never said I wasn't." Nico chuckled.

"But you know," said Sadie, "You're not stupid. Only a genius could have come up with a plan like that . . . or a madman."

"Which one are you accusing me of being?" Nico wanted to know.

"Which do you think?" asked Sadie.

"You know, this isn't over," said Anubis, after they'd all had a good chuckle over that.

"Of course I know that," said Nico. "You're still stuck in my head. My father's still going to freak out if he finds out. And we're still the most likely candidates for the next big doomsday prophecy."

"But we won this round," said Sadie. "Hades won't be wiping out the House of Life, and he won't be immediately declaring war on the Egyptian pantheon. I'd call that a victory, wouldn't you?"

Nico and Anubis both nodded in unison, which made Sadie laugh. She actually had a nice laugh, and a nice smile when she wasn't being overly sarcastic, Nico thought.

"We should go get Carter and Percy," said Sadie after they stayed there in silence for about half a minute, either basking in their victory or catching their breath and steadying their nerves.

"Yeah," he said. "We should." But he didn't get up immediately, even though Anubis did. "I'm just so tired," he muttered. "I feel like I could sleep a week."

"Come on," Sadie told him. She held out a hand to help him up, at the exact same time that Anubis did the exact same thing. They looked at each other a bit surprised, while Nico looked at both of them, with equal surprise. But then he took their hands and let them pull him to his feet because he was too tired to pretend to be dignified.

"It seems a shame though . . ." said Anubis.

"What does?" asked Nico.

"I was right about to crush your pathetic Gorgon card like a bug," Anubis told him.

"What? No you weren't!" said Nico indignantly. "She has mega earth defense and a plus 10 retaliation stat! That match would so have been mine."

The god and the demigodling both gave each other hard looks then turned their gazes to where the cards were still set up on the sarcophagus. Then, as one, they both turned to look at Sadie who sighed.

"Go on," she told them. "Finish your game. I'll go get the others." She started to walk away then stopped. "But just this one game," she said sternly. "It's winner-take-all. No rematches, no do-overs, none of that. Got it, Death Boys?"

"Yes," said Anubis, disappearing from where he stood right next to them, and reappearing in his place on top of the grave vault as if he'd shadow traveled.

"Yes," Nico echoed, but took his time striding over to the sarcophagus and climbing back up on it. He was tired, after all, but not too tired to taunt his opponent once he was situated and had picked up his cards once more. "Get ready to die, death god."

* * *

Next chapter will be the last chapter of this fic, but more fics in this AU will follow. I'll be putting the characters that you guys have asked for in them: Annabeth, Thalia, and Paul (who was in an earlier rewrite of one of these chapters, but got cut out because I'm not that great at writing scenes with so many characters because they tend to disappear into the background.) and others.

And yes, there is going to definitely be some awkwardness for Nico and Anubis in store in regards to Sadie, and probably where Zia is concerned as well, since she's possessed by Anubis's mother.

And lastly, thanks again to Lostbeyondreason who drew my very first fan art ever, a picture of Nico and Anubis playing Mythomagic in a graveyard, which was the mental picture that inspired this fic. I know I've mentioned it before, but if you haven't seen it yet, please check out the link on my profile. I love that picture and printed it out to put on my wall above my PC, lol, and the title she gave it worked its way into the dialogue in this chapter.


	14. Chapter 14

Epilogue

The Kanes laid low at Percy's apartment for about a week so that the dust had time to settle. They only returned to their mansion after they were sure that the House of Life had stopped head-hunting them, and weren't gunning for them any worse than they'd been before the whole kidnapping incident had started.

Nico shadow-traveled their entire group onto the Kanes' balcony. They entered cautiously, each of them with their weapon at the ready in case the House of Life had left any agents lurking about. Once they were satisfied that they were the only ones there, they set about repairing the house's wards. Or rather Sadie, Carter, and Bast repaired the wards. Nico and Percy stayed back, out of the way.

"Anubis says I'll be able to do magic like that," commented Nico as they watched. "Or at least, I should be able to."

"Is that what you want?" asked Percy.

"The more ways I know how to protect myself or attack someone, the better off I'll be," said Nico rationally.

"That's not what I asked," said Percy.

Nico sighed, realizing that his cousin wasn't going to let this go. "I wouldn't have chosen this," he admitted. "Getting a god stuck in my head, being conscripted into Egyptian magic training, getting kidnapped by a sadistic witch, and dragging you into the whole mess was not what I had in mind when I decided to take a walk in Central Park. But now that this is the path I'm on . . . I guess it's not so bad."

"You're planning to stay here with them?" Percy wanted to know.

"For awhile. They're the only ones who can teach me how to deal with my new powers, and probably the best chance I have of figuring out a way to unfuse my soul from Anubis's. Then there's that End of Days prophecy to consider . . ."

Percy put a hand on his shoulder and gave him a small shake. "We'll figure out. We'll make this prophecy not about you."

Looking at his cousin, Nico could tell that Percy truly believed that. He, himself wasn't so certain. But he was glad to have Percy on his side.

"I don't want more people knowing about this than absolutely have to," said Nico.

"If we don't get Anubis out of your head, someone's going to find out sooner or later," said Percy.

"Let's hope for later then."

He waited to see if there would be an argument. He knew Percy. His cousin was all about trust and teamwork. He'd want to get his other friends to help them on this one. Annabeth, for certain, and probably Grover and Rachel too. And though Nico liked those three well enough, he was wary of them. His father thought him stupid and naïve, and Nico knew that to some extent, that was true, but he was learning better. Hades himself had taught Nico how few people could really be trusted. In fact, the only people Nico really trusted now were Anubis and Percy. Anubis, because the god was in his head, and he had no choice in the matter. Percy because his cousin had proven time and time again how far he was willing to go to help his friends, and for reasons unbeknownst to Nico, Percy considered him a friend.

"If that's what you want, then I won't tell them," said Percy after a long hesitation, and Nico released the breath he hadn't realized he was holding. "Yet," Percy continued. "There may come a time when I have to tell someone."

"Use your best judgment," Nico told him. "I . . . trust you."

Percy must have known how hard those words were for Nico to say, because he clapped his cousin's shoulder and shook him again. "We'll get through this."

"Finished," said Sadie, walking back to the cousins with her brother. "As long as you don't throw anymore blood on the windows or walls, we should be good."

"Yeah . . . sorry about that," said Nico, feeling a little sheepish.

"Don't worry about it," Carter told him. "You didn't know. But I find it very interesting. I wonder if your blood corrodes all types of Egyptian magic. Or if it will effect Greek magic as well?"

"Next time I'm at Camp Halfblood I'll test it out," promised Nico, then smirked at Percy. "On Clarise's spear."

Percy smirked and shook his head.

"Is this the room that Nico will be staying in?" asked a voice from right behind them.

Everyone jumped and weapons were drawn out again, but they all relaxed when Anubis stepped out of the shadows.

"Yes," Sadie told him. "This is Nico's room for as long as he wants it."

"He's about to ask if you mind if he paints the walls black," Anubis informed them.

Nico glared at the god. "Stop that. Just because I pwned you at Mythomagic doesn't mean you should act like a three-year-old all week."

"It was only dumb luck that you won," growled Anubis. "Not any real skill."

"You can keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better," Nico told him.

"You can paint the walls," said Carter, trying to stave off yet another debate about the outcome of that epic Mythomagic battle. "Or we might be able to change their color with magic."

"Don't waste your power on that," said Anubis. He raised one hand, pointed at the wall, and made a few sounds that were more like dry barking noises than actual words. The walls darkened and took on a grainy, stone texture, then hieroglyphics and Egyptian death murals came into view. The overhead light disappeared but torches sprouted on the walls, shedding an eerie green light, much like the ones at the Hades Cabin. Then tombstones and statues that looked like they belonged in a graveyard rose from the floor, giving the room a nice, homey feeling. Anubis admired his work for a moment with a satisfied smile. "I wasn't sure if that would work," he confessed. "But it seems that a room belonging to a death god's son counts as a place of death or mourning."

"You turned his room into a room of death," said Carter slowly and warily, looking at Nico as though he wasn't sure if the younger boy would be alright with this.

"Cool," said Nico. "Thanks. I now forgive you for cheating and stealing looks at my cards."

"I never –"

"You did!"

"What is this?" demanded Bast from the doorway. "I leave for a minute and you let the dog inhabit a room here?"

"Stop calling me a dog!" Nico and Anubis both snapped in unison. Then Nico shook his head and amended. "I mean, stop calling _him_ a dog!"

Bast looked at Sadie and Carter. "Having them here will draw trouble."

"No more trouble than you," said Anubis. "You're the one they want to seal away. As far as they're concerned, Nico's just a demigod, and one who's father is willing to start a war if anyone harms him. Our presence here actually gives them more protection than they'd have otherwise."

"We haven't been doing too good finding others with the blood of the pharaohs so far, Bast," Sadie pointed out. "He's the next best thing."

"Next best?" muttered Nico.

"We need allies," said Carter. "And he needs our help."

"Your uncle will not approve."

"He can disapprove all he wants," said Sadie. "They stay. Nico and Anubis are part of the team now. Percy too, but I don't think his mom will let him stay."

"I won't be here all the time," Nico warned them. "I have to train with the dead and get better control over my demigod powers."

"And Camp Halfblood in the summer," put in Percy, and Nico nodded. He wouldn't mind going to camp while the people he liked were there.

"When you have other stuff to do, you can go do it," Sadie told him. "This room's here for you when you want it."

"So yeah," said Carter, nodding to both Nico and Anubis. "Welcome home."

* * *

Antarctica (Three-hundred-and-sixtieth Nome)

Aziza glared at the magical penguin as it waddled out of the room and considered casting a fire spell on it, but she knew it wouldn't do any good. One small flame compared to the arctic chill was absolutely nothing.

Beside her Hakim shivered and tried to shuffle a deck of cards with hands that were too cold to move properly.

"I can't believe this," said Aziza, for what must have been the fiftieth time since arriving in the 360th Nome. "We did nothing except what we were told to do and somehow we're to blame for the entire di Angelo Incident!"

That was what the fiasco was now being called. And the high lector had decided to pin the blame for it on Aziza and Hakim, just because they were the ones who first encountered Nico di Angelo. Now Aziza wished that she had killed the little brat when she'd had the chance. A war with the Greek pantheon would have been interesting at least. It would be a thousand times better than being bored out of her mind as she froze in Antarctica, with only Hakim the mediocre idiot and some magic penguins for company.

"It's your fault," muttered Hakim. "You were the one who nearly killed him."

"You were the first one to attack him. I was backing you up! It's your fault!"

"It was you who let them escape from the First Nome."

"I was facing both Kanes, their pet goddess, and the two demigods, and I might as well have been facing them alone because my back up didn't help at all! And then I got mobbed by those damned tiger fish!"

Hakim snickered.

Aziza snapped.

She pointed her staff at Hakim, and spoke the word for the most powerful fire spell that she knew. Hakim went up in flames like last year's Christmas tree. His nervous system was burnt to a crisp before he even had the chance to scream.

Aziza allowed herself one sick smile and a short moment of laughter before sweeping the evidence into the Duat, where no one would find it.

_Poor Hakim, _she would say when she had to report on her partner's disappearance._ Wandered outside right before a storm and never came back. I've searched so hard, trying to find his body, to bring it home, but I'm afraid he's buried under ice somewhere._

She'd pretend to still be loyal to the House of Life despite this slight, but in truth, she now considered herself freelance. They couldn't punish her like this and expect her to take it laying down, but she'd let them think they could. Ostracizing herself from the House of Life would just be stupid. They were a powerful organization, and for now she still needed their backing. So she'd serve out the rest of her sentence in the 360th Nome, and then she'd set about getting revenge on those who'd caused this. Her superiors. The Kanes. And those two meddling demigods.

She smiled cruelly as she thought about how Nico di Angelo had been writhing in pain the last time she had him in her grasp.

_I'll see you again soon, pet._

The End

* * *

Thank you for reading all the way to the end, and for all the feedback that everyone who's reviewed has left me. Sorry it took me so long to get this last chapter up. I had a hard time writing it so that it felt right, and had to keep starting over because I wanted to get it just right. This is the newest and best draft of it, and I knew you guys were probably getting tired of waiting, so here it finally is!

Like I said earlier, I'm planning other stories in this AU, and I'm taking into consideration all requests that have been made, because I know I'm not the only one with good ideas about what should happen. Annabeth, Paul, and Thalia will be in future stories. Nico's going to learn more about the Kanes and what they've been through, and the Kanes are going to hear more about the demigods' adventures. If you have any ideas you want me to try to incorporate, please let me know in a review.

Also, I've gotten a couple PMs from people asking permission to use this AU. My answer to them, and anyone else who might want to write a story in this AU is go for it!


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